Sukhov v Russia

Sukhov v Russia (32805/03)

On 21 July 1997, former police officer Valeriy Sukhov was arrested and detained on allegations of aggravated bribery under Article 290(4) of the Russian Criminal Code. He was released from detention on 22 January 1998 and ordered not to leave the town. Subsequently, for more than two years, the criminal proceedings against Mr Sukhov were repeatedly adjourned and resumed. On 15 March 2001, Mr Sukhov was committed to stand trial before the Irkutsk Regional Court. On 24 April 2001, the Regional Court returned Mr Sukhov’s case file to the authorities with directions to correct procedural defects and, on 29 March 2002, the same Court returned the file to the same authorities after finding that the investigation was incomplete.

Eventually, Mr Sukhov stood trial on 15 December 2002. Between 15 December 2002 and 10 February 2005, 26 hearings were scheduled for Mr Sukhov’s case, although 13 of these were adjourned or cancelled. The reasons for the adjournments ranged from the illness of the applicant, to the failure of prosecution witnesses to attend trial. During this time the composition of the Regional Court’s bench was also changed, meaning that the trial had to start again.

On 10 February 2005, the Regional Court found Mr Sukhov guilty of bribe-taking and sentenced to him two years imprisonment. The judgment was upheld by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on 21 July 2005.

In its judgment, the European Court of Human Rights noted that neither party believed the case to be particularly difficult to determine. Consequently, the Court believed that an overall period of more than seven years must prima facie fall outside the ‘reasonable-time’ requirement contained within Article 6(1) of the Convention (the right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time). Whilst the Court accepted that delays by Mr Sukhov and his lawyer accounted for approximately 10 months, it found that the failings by the Russian authorities (in particular the re-composition of the Regional Court’s bench and the absence of prosecution witnesses) rendered the overall length of the proceedings ‘excessive’.

Consequently, the Court found that the length of proceedings failed to meet the ‘reasonable-time’ requirement, in violation of Article 6(1) of the Convention.

Mr Sukhov’s arguments under Articles 2, 3 and 5 of the Convention on the grounds of the allegedly poor conditions of his detention were rejected as being ill-founded.

The Court awarded Mr Sukhov €3,600 (euros) in non-pecuniary damages.

Sukhov_judgment

Press release: Sukhov judgment

The above admissibility decision is taken from the website of the European Court of Human Rights http://www.echr.coe.int/ and can be accessed via HUDOC on the court's website: http://cmiskp.echr.coe.int/tkp197/default.htm

The Court's case-law is also collated in Reports of Judgments and Decisions, published by Carl Heymanns Verlag KG.