Published on 25 August 2025
FIFTH SECTION
Applications nos. 53492/20 and 38938/21
Mykola Yuriyovych VYGOVSKYY and Others against Ukraine
and Mykola Yuriyovych VYGOVSKYY and Others against Ukraine
lodged on 3 December 2020 and 12 July 2021 respectively
communicated on 8 August 2025
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASES
The applications concern alleged actions taken by the police against the applicants in the course of a demonstration. The applicants invoke Articles 3, 5 §§ 1 and 5 and Article 11 of the Convention (see the Appendix).
On 15 June 2020 the Kyiv Shevchenkivskyi District Court was examining the question of imposing a preventive measure on Mr S. The case against S., which attracted much public attention, concerned a homicide. According to S.’s supporters, he killed the victim in legitimate self-defence after the latter had attacked him due to his political views.
A group of S.’s supporters assembled in front of the courthouse. According to the applicants’ description of events, a crew from a TV channel (with whose coverage S.’s supporters apparently did not agree) was preparing to broadcast from the courthouse steps. The first applicant started criticising the TV crew over the loudspeaker and turned on a “siren”. Other demonstrators joined him. The police asked the first applicant to stop but he refused.
Clashes between the police and demonstrators ensued. Publicly available video coverage of the events produced by many media outlets[1] shows the police standing at the courthouse entrance surrounded by a crowd some of them holding smoke bombs.
The police arrested the applicants (other than the fifth, Mr Lozynskyy, who is a Member of Ukrainian Parliament) and charged those applicants with administrative offences of petty hooliganism, malicious disobedience of lawful orders and, for the first applicant (Mr Vygovskyy), breach of the procedure for organising and holding meetings. The offence reports contained only generic descriptions of the acts allegedly committed, copied from the relevant provisions of the Code of Administrative Offences.[2] The arrested applicants were released within two to three hours.
On the dates set out in the Appendix, the Kyiv Shevchenkivskyi District Court discontinued the proceedings on the grounds that the charges in the relevant offence reports lacked detail as to what specific actions the applicants committed and contained no evidence of the alleged acts.
Some of the applicants sustained injuries, allegedly as a result of ill-treatment by the police in the course of the above events.
The applicants lodged complaints seeking prosecution of police officers on suspicion of unlawful interference with activities of a Member of Ukrainian Parliament and abuse of power.[3] On 16 November 2021 criminal proceedings instituted on those complaints were discontinued for lack of corpus delicti. An investigator concluded that the police had acted lawfully in trying to stop the crowd of hundreds of S.’s supporters from breaking into the courthouse. On 23 June 2022 the Kyiv Pecherskyi District Court quashed that decision as premature and having taken without sufficient examination of the facts and the applicants’ arguments. According to the most recently available information, the investigation is still pending.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Have the first to fourth applicants (Mr Vygovskyy, Mr Kiryakov, Mr Kovalenko and Mr Martynenko) exhausted all effective domestic remedies in respect of their complaints under Articles 5 § 1 and 11 of the Convention, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention? In particular, could the following remedies be considered effective for the applicants’ relevant complaints:
- an appeal under Article 267 of the Code of Administrative Offences and/or a claim under the Law of Ukraine on the Procedure for Compensating Damage caused by the Unlawful Actions of Bodies in charge of Operational Enquiries, Pre-trial Investigation, Prosecutors or Courts (see, for example and mutatis mutandis, Grigoryan and Sergeyeva v. Ukraine, no. 63409/11, § 82, 28 March 2017; Orlovskiy v. Ukraine, no. 12222/09, §§ 58-61, 2 April 2015; Dubovtsev and Others v. Ukraine, nos. 21429/14 and 9 others, §§ 58-65, 21 January 2021; Vorontsov and Others v. Ukraine, nos. 58925/14 and 4 others, §§ 39 and 40, 21 January 2021; Lysyuk v. Ukraine, no. 72531/13, § 44, 14 October 2021; Vadym Melnyk v. Ukraine, nos. 62209/17 and 50933/18, §§ 90-93, 16 September 2022);
- a claim before administrative courts (see, for example and mutatis mutandis, Chernega and Others v. Ukraine, no. 74768/10, §§ 90-92, 18 June 2019; Ishkhanyan v. Armenia, no. 5297/16, §§ 115-23, 13 February 2025) and, for a possible example of domestic case-law on the matter, judgment of the Kyiv Administrative Court of Appeal of 14 October 2014 in case no. 826/1493/14[4])?
2. In respect of the second and fifth applicants (Mr Kiryakov and Mr Lozynskyy):
2.1. Have the applicants been subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment, in breach of Article 3 of the Convention?
2.2. Having regard to the procedural protection from inhuman or degrading treatment (see Labita v. Italy [GC], no. 26772/95, § 131, ECHR 2000-IV), was the investigation in the present case by the domestic authorities in breach of Article 3 of the Convention?
3. In respect of the first to fourth applicants (Mr Vygovskyy, Mr Kiryakov, Mr Kovalenko and Mr Martynenko):
3.1. Were the applicants deprived of their liberty in breach of Article 5 § 1 of the Convention?
3.2. Did the applicants have an effective and enforceable right to compensation for detention in contravention of Article 5 § 1, as required by Article 5 § 5 of the Convention?
4. Did the circumstances of the case disclose an “interference” with the first, third and fourth applicants’ (Mr Vygovskyy’s, Mr Kovalenko’s and Mr Martynenko’s) rights guaranteed by Article 11 § 1 of the Convention? If so, was the interference “prescribed by law” and “necessary in a democratic society” within the meaning of Article 11 § 2?
APPENDIX
No.
Applicant
Year of Birth
Place of Residence
Administrative proceedings discontinued on; provisions of the Code of Administrative Offences charged
Complaints notice of which is given to the Government: in which application(s) they were raised
1
Mykola Yuriyovych VYGOVSKYY
1988
Vyshneve
11/08/2020: Art. 185, 185-1;
20/01/2021: Art. 173
Articles 5, 11: 53492/20
2
Oleksandr Yevgenovych KIRYAKOV
1992
Kyiv
11/08/2020: Art. 173, 185
Article 3: 38938/21
Article 5: 53492/20
3
Anton Valeriyovych KOVALENKO
1990
Kyiv
13/08/2020: Art. 173, 185
Articles 5, 11: 53492/20
4
Andriy Suratovych MARTYNENKO
1991
Kyiv
20/08/2020: Art. 173, 185
Articles 5, 11: 53492/20
5
Roman Mykhaylovych LOZYNSKYY
1994
Lviv
N/A
Article 3: 38938/21
[1] For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZA4ZskPsS5o ; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mx0tIEggDgQ (last visited on 4 July 2025).
[2] Articles 173, 185 and 185-1 of the Code of Administrative Offences respectively.
[3] Articles 351 and 365 of the Criminal Code respectively.
[4] Available at https://reyestr.court.gov.ua/Review/41060676 (last visited on 3 July 2025).