Communicated on 26 August 2016
FIFTH SECTION
Application no. 36852/11
Vugar Ibrahim oglu ALIYEV
against Azerbaijan
lodged on 25 May 2011
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Mr Vugar Aliyev, is an Azerbaijani national who was born in 1981 and is currently serving life sentence in Gobustan Prison. He is represented before the Court by Mr A. Mustafayev, a lawyer practising in Azerbaijan.
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On 9 May 2003 the applicant was arrested by the Shamkir District Police in connection with the murder of the son of a senior State official. The applicant was charged with several offences, including premeditated and aggravated murder, illegally purchasing an offensive weapon (a knife), involving a minor in a crime and theft.
On 9 May 2003 the applicant’s fiancée, L.G, who was sixteen years old at the material time, was questioned as a witness by the Shamkir District Police and later arrested as the co-accused and charged with premeditated murder. In her first witness statement at the police office, she mentioned that she had planned the murder and stabbed the victim to death herself. During the later pre-trial investigation, she gave a statement incriminating the applicant.
In proceedings before the Court of Serious Crimes, the applicant stated that he had not planned the murder and had not stabbed the victim, but had mainly helped his fiancée to remove traces of the crime after the murder had taken place in his presence. In that connection, he elaborated that he had met the victim on his fiancée’s suggestion to clarify rumours that she had been having an affair with him. During the trial, the co-accused retracted the statement she had given during the pre-trial investigation, complaining that she had been coerced at the police office to give a statement incriminating the applicant. She also mentioned that she could not complain of ill‑treatment at the material time since her mother, her only parent, had also been arrested in connection with the murder. As a minor she was isolated from the outside world and unable to have proper recourse to the legal remedies.
On 22 December 2003 the Court of Serious Crimes found the applicant guilty of premeditated and aggravated murder, involving a minor as an accomplice in a crime, illegally purchasing an offensive weapon (a knife), theft and sexual intercourse with a minor. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. The court concluded that the applicant had killed the victim because of a business dispute his father had been having with the victim’s father, a senior State official.
The court also found the co-accused L.G. guilty of premeditated and aggravated murder and theft and sentenced her to ten years’ imprisonment.
On 6 February 2004, following an appeal by the applicant, the Court of Appeal held a hearing at Detention Facility No. 1. According to the applicant, the court did not hold a full rehearing of the case and the hearing lasted between five and eight minutes. The public, including the applicant’s relatives, the media and the representatives of the civil society were not granted access to the hearing. In his appeal, the applicant complained, inter alia, that the first-instance court had relied on the co-accused’s incriminating statement given during the pre-trial investigation instead of the retracting statement given in court. On 6 February 2004 the Court of Appeal upheld the judgment of the Court of Serious Crimes.
On 26 October 2004 the applicant lodged a cassation appeal with the Supreme Court. He complained, inter alia, that the judiciary had lacked independence and impartiality, that his co-accused’s incriminating statement had been admitted as decisive evidence despite being obtained by coercion and ill-treatment by the police, and that he had not been given a public hearing before the Court of Appeal.
The applicant was served with a notice by the prison service where he was serving his sentence, informing him that his cassation appeal had been sent to the Supreme Court with an accompanying letter no. 17/13-1093 of 26 October 2004. By a decision of 22 January 2008 the Supreme Court refused to hear the case on the ground that the applicant had missed the time-limit for lodging his cassation appeal. By decisions of 17 June 2009, 10 March 2010 and 16 July 2010 the Supreme Court refused to grant repeated applications by the applicant to have the time-limit for lodging a cassation appeal restored.
The applicant applied to the Ombudsman of the Republic of Azerbaijan and several international organisations to assist him with having his cassation appeal heard by the Supreme Court. On 24 November 2010 the Supreme Court restored the time-limit for a cassation appeal. It held that because the prison service had failed to send the cassation appeal, it had not received it in time. On 15 December 2010 the Supreme Court dismissed the applicant’s cassation appeal and upheld the judgment of the Court of Appeal.
COMPLAINTS
The applicant complains under Article 6 of the Convention: (1) that his right to a hearing within a reasonable time was violated; 2) that he did not have a public and fair hearing before the Court of Appeal, and (3) that the courts used evidence obtained unlawfully and in breach of Convention rights and did not provide reasoning of the judgments in this regard.
Relying on Article 13 of the Convention, the applicant alleges that he did not have an effective domestic remedy at his disposal for his relevant complaints under Article 6 of the Convention.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Did the applicant have a fair hearing in the determination of the criminal charge against him, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, in particular with regard to the manner in which the evidence provided by the applicant’s co-accused L.G. was taken and used in the proceedings?
2. Has there been a public hearing before the Court of Appeal in the present case, as required by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention? If not, was holding the hearing in a detention facility and the exclusion of the public in the present case “strictly necessary”, within the meaning of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?
3. Was the length of the criminal proceedings in the present case in breach of the “reasonable time” requirement of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?
4. Did the applicant have an effective domestic remedy at his disposal for his complaint about the “reasonable time” requirement of Article 6 of the Convention, as required by Article 13 of the Convention?
5. The parties are requested to submit copies of all documents relating to the criminal proceedings.
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy