Via Greek Helsinki Monitor

The European Court of Human Rights has ruled against Greece in the case of Dimitris Zelilof, who was ill-treated/beaten by police back in December 2001. He was awarded 19,000 euros for damages as well as costs and damages. After the ruling, Zelilof said

I am happy that the European Court vindicated me after 5.5 years. I regret that I had to go to Strasbourg to achieve that. If though the Hellenic Police, the Greek Ombudsman and the two prosecutors in Thessaloniki had evaluated correctly the evidence and documents available to them as well as to the European Court, I would have been vindicated here, the perpetrators police officers would have been fired and Avgoustinos Dimitriou would have avoided the beating of last November. Unfortunately, my friends and I did not have a television camera to prove our allegations. I hope that the application of my friend Panayote Galotskin to Strasbourg would be successful too, as he was also badly beaten that December 2001 night. Most importantly, I hope that my fatherland will take seriously the message of today’s ruling so as to stop being shamed internationally in ways it does not deserve. I finally thank Greek Helsinki Monitor for its moral and legal support from the beginning until the final vindication

Full case and judgements below.

PRESS RELEASE

26 May 2007

Greece ill-treated citizen, European Court of Human Rights rules

Greek Helsinki Monitor (GHM) expresses great satisfaction on the 24 May European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) unanimous conviction of Greece in the Case of Zelilof. The application No. 17060/2003 was submitted to the ECtHR by GHM. According to the ECHR, Greece violated twice Article 3 (prohibition of torture) of the European Convention on Human Rights, both in its substantive part (police officers ill-treated Dimitris Zelilof) and in its procedural part (there was no effective investigation into the ill-treatment), and must award the victim 19,900 euros for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage, as well as costs and expenses. The events of 23 December 2001 that led to the conviction and the ECtHR ruling are briefly described in the Court’s release attached.

One more victim of police violence in the same incident, Panayote Galotskin, had pursued separate domestic remedies which were exhausted with an acquittal of the police officers exactly one year ago, on 25-26 May 2006, by the Three-Member Appeals Court of Thessaloniki. Panayote Galotskin, too, has applied to the ECtHR through GHM.

It is noteworthy that Apostolos Aposotlidis and Paschalis Statharidis, two of the police officers involved in the 23 December 2001 incident, are among the nine police officers currently facing criminal and disciplinary proceedings for the ill-treatment of Cypriot student Avgoustinos Dimitriou, on 17 November 2006, in Thessaloniki. Apostolos Aposotlidis has been suspended while Paschalis Statharidis has been transferred. A third and senior police officer facing the same proceedings for the 17 November 2006 incident, Nikos Pappas, however, while he was also announced to have been transferred, is in fact since March 2007 the Director of the Police Directorate in the Prefecture of Kilkis, near Thessaloniki and along Greece’s border with the Republic of Macedonia. Luckily for Avgoustinos Dimitriou, his aggravated beating by police officers was caught by a television camera. The video thus belied the initial police announcement that the student had been injured by a “jardinière” of Hotel ABC. In December 2001, though, there was no camera and that helped the police officers involved to avoid all disciplinary and criminal sanctions, as well as to continue their work (including beatings) in the following five years…

GHM notes that this is only the third conviction of Greece by the ECtHR for a violation of Article 3 in a case of ill-treatment by police. The first ruling was issued on 13 December 2005, concerned the beating of Roma Lazaros Bekos and Eleftherios Koutropoulos in May 1998, and was the result of an application filed also by GHM. The second ruling was issued on 18 January 2007, and concerned the beating of Syrian Mhn Ghassan Alsayed Allaham in September 1998.

Dimitris Zelidis (he subsequently changed his family name) after the ruling said: “I am happy that the European Court vindicated me after 5.5 years. I regret that I had to go to Strasbourg to achieve that. If though the Hellenic Police, the Greek Ombudsman and the two prosecutors in Thessaloniki had evaluated correctly the evidence and documents available to them as well as to the European Court, I would have been vindicated here, the perpetrators police officers would have been fired and Avgoustinos Dimitriou would have avoided the beating of last November. Unfortunately, my friends and I did not have a television camera to prove our allegations. I hope that the application of my friend Panayote Galotskin to Strasbourg would be successful too, as he was also badly beaten that December 2001 night. Most importantly, I hope that my fatherland will take seriously the message of today’s ruling so as to stop being shamed internationally in ways it does not deserve. I finally thank Greek Helsinki Monitor for its moral and legal support from the beginning until the final vindication.”

The responsibility of the Hellenic Police and the prosecutors is well presented in the judgment. What is more disturbing and not included in it is the failure of the Greek Ombudsman to share its findings on the case with the police authorities concerned and the victim himself who had complained to the independent authority on 29 January 2002. In its “Special Report: Disciplinary – Administrative investigations into allegations against police officers,” dated July 2004, the Greek Ombudsman had expressed his particular disappointment over the fact that crucial pieces of evidence such as medical certificates etc were effectively disregarded by police officers holding administrative inquiries, who found the allegations “unsubstantiated”. The Ombudsman classified the Zelilof complaint (downloadable pdf: Ref. No. 2964/02) as a case with “deficiencies during the assessment of evidentiary means” and “wrongful legal appraisal” and added:

This issue emerges with intensity mainly in cases of pro forma and without any critical assessment reference to the effect that the existing medical certificates were taken into consideration while deciding on the issue of disciplinary punishment, without, however, providing an adequate explanation for the conclusions of the administrative investigation, especially in cases where, for example, the nature of the bodily injuries attested to by the medical certificates, would clearly warrant a more careful examination. By way of example, reference is made to ref. no. 2964/02 complaint during the examination of which the Ombudsman’s Office noted that the extent of the bodily injuries, as borne out by the medical certificates assessed by police in a pro forma way, pointed to the possibility that either the police officers involved were exceeding the limits of self-defence or that they [police officers] had committed the offence of Article 137A of the Greek Criminal Code [Torture]. As a consequence, the Hellenic Police should have assessed the evidence before it in a more careful and substantiated way. Due to the pro forma only assessment of evidence, the validity of any ensuing judgment of police disciplinary organs bodies is justifiably rendered vulnerable and receptive to all kinds of criticism.

In cases like the one mentioned above, suspicions concerning the perfunctory assessment of the available evidentiary means emerge naturally. Because of the pro forma assessment of evidence, the validity of every decision of the police disciplinary bodies justifiably becomes vulnerable and receptive to all kinds of criticism, when it [the decision] disregards the teachings of the legal science and of the methods it employs in establishing the actual facts of a case

Yet all that the Greek Ombudsman never shared in time with either the police to seek a review of the investigation or with the plaintiff so as to allow him seek such review or other appropriate action that may have helped him obtain satisfaction domestically.

Finally, GHM would like to highlight the conclusion of the concurring opinion of the President of the ECtHR Chamber Judge Loukis Loucaides joined by Judge Giorgio Malinverni:

I must add that in finding myself that the State in this case is also responsible under Article 3 on account of the inhuman and degrading treatment suffered by the applicant as a result of the conduct of the police officers inside Toumba police station, I took the following facts into account as corroboration of this finding:

(a) the finding that the applicant was ill-treated soon after his arrest and up to his transfer to the police station, which is shared by the majority;

(b) the inadequacy of the investigation into the applicant’s allegations as regards his ill-treatment by the police both before he entered the police station and afterwards; and

(c) the lamentable explanations given in the report of the police administrative investigation – endorsed by the prosecuting authorities – which was confined to the depositions of the police officers and their denials of the applicant’s allegations, without questioning the witnesses. The report even went so far as to find that the applicant had failed to submit to an examination by the forensic doctor, thereby turning a blind eye to the forensic medical examination he underwent on 29 January 2002.

In the circumstances I find that the applicant’s allegations that he was ill-treated by the police at Toumba police station are well-founded and that the State was responsible for such ill-treatment.

EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS
24.5.2007

Press release issued by the Registrar

CHAMBER JUDGEMENT
ZELILOF v. GREECE

The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment1 in the case of Zelilof v. Greece (application no. 17060/03, judgment available in English.

The Court held unanimously that there had been:

(a) a violation of Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights concerning the ill-treatment of the applicant by the police; and

(b) a violation of Article 3 in that the investigation into his ill-treatment was ineffective.
Under Article 41 (just satisfaction) of the Convention, the Court awarded the applicant 1,400 euros (EUR) for pecuniary damage, EUR 15,000 for non-pecuniary damage and EUR 3,500 for costs and expenses. (The judgment is available only in English.)

1. Principal facts

The applicant, Dimitrios Zelilof, is a Greek citizen of Russian-Pontic origin who was born in 1978 and lives in Salonika (Greece).
In the evening of 23 December 2001 the applicant saw police officers doing an identity check on passengers of a car in Ano Toumba, a district of Salonika. The applicant, who knew the passengers, asked what was going on. He was then asked by the police to identify himself.
The parties submitted different accounts of the events which followed.

According to the applicant, as he did not have his identity card with him, he suggested going to the nearby police station in Toumba, where his identity card had been issued. He alleged that one of the police officers then accused him of being “the tough guy” and that Constable Tsiorakis wrapped his handcuffs around his fist, punched him in the mouth and then kicked him in the chest and abdomen.

The Government maintained that the applicant ignored warnings not to approach the car and refused to identify himself. He then pushed a police officer and hit him in the face and punched and kicked two other officers trying to arrest him. The applicant managed to escape after two other people joined in.
According to the testimony of another police officer, he then fired three warning shots in the air “in a safe way” to intimidate the applicant.

The applicant claimed that he subsequently went to Toumba Police Station to complain about his ill-treatment, where he was handcuffed, beaten and kicked for about 30 minutes by a number of police officers, including those who had carried out the initial road check.

According to the Government, the applicant was arrested later that day, but neither he nor his acquaintances were mistreated by police officers at the police station.

The applicant was transferred by ambulance to Aghios Dimitrios Hospital in Salonika, where he remained until 28 December 2001.

A medical report dated 2 January 2002 noted that the applicant had head and back injuries requiring stitching and slight concussion and bruising. A forensic expert’s medical examination of 29 January 2002 found that the applicant had, among other things, a dislocated jaw and broken tooth and “medium-intensity bodily injury, caused by blunt instruments” from which it would take at least 18-21 days to recover.

According to hospital notes, three police officers had bruising or heavy bruising following the incident. They were admitted to hospital on 23 December 2001 and discharged the next day. Three other police officers were not medically examined by a forensic doctor.

On 8 January 2002 Salonika Police Headquarters ordered an administrative investigation into the circumstances surrounding the three police officers’ injuries and whether they had committed a disciplinary offence. The testimonies of the civilians involved were considered to be subjective while the credibility of the police officers’ statements was assumed. The forensic report of 29 January 2002 was not taken into account. The investigation concluded that the police officers involved had used appropriate physical force, given that they were assaulted by 10 to 15 people and that there was a real danger that their firearms might have been snatched and used against them. The applicant’s allegations of ill-treatment at the police station were dismissed.

On 14 January 2005 the applicant was sentenced by Salonika Court of First Instance to 14 months’ imprisonment for resisting lawful authority. The court found that the police had been hindered either physically or verbally by up to 15 of the applicant’s acquaintances. The case is currently pending before the domestic courts.

On 14 January 2002 the applicant lodged a criminal complaint against the police officers who had allegedly beaten him, which was dismissed as “factually unfounded” on 2 July 2002. Both prosecutors in the judicial proceedings endorsed the conclusions reached in the administrative investigation on the basis of the depositions of the police officers. No witnesses were questioned personally by either prosecutor. The applicant appealed unsuccessfully.

2. Procedure and composition of the Court

The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 20 May 2003.
Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:
Loukis Loucaides (Cypriot), President,
Christos Rozakis (Greek),
Nina Vajić (Croatian),
Khanlar Hajiyev (Azerbaijani),
Dean Spielmann (Luxemburger),
Sverre Erik Jebens (Norwegian),
Giorgio Malinverni (Swiss), judges,
and also Søren Nielsen, Section Registrar.

3. Summary of the judgement 2

Complaints
The applicant alleged, in particular, that he had been subjected to acts of police brutality and that the authorities had failed to carry out an adequate investigation into the incident, in breach of Articles 3 and 13 of the Convention. He further alleged that the events in question had been motivated by racial prejudice, in breach of Article 14.
Decision of the Court

Article 3
Concerning the ill-treatment

The Court observed that it was undisputed that the applicant’s injuries, as shown by the medical reports, were caused by the use of force by the police. Against that background, given the serious nature of the applicant’s injuries, it was for the Government to demonstrate with convincing arguments that the use of force was not excessive.
The Court noted that the applicant was injured in the course of a random operation which gave rise to unexpected developments. The police officers were therefore required to react without prior preparation. The Court bore in mind the difficulties in policing modern societies, the unpredictability of human conduct and the operational choices which had to be made in terms of priorities and resources. Furthermore, Salonika Court of First Instance had established that the applicant had physically resisted his arrest and that the three police officers had been assaulted by ten to 15 of the applicant’s acquaintances.

The Court acknowledged that the three police officers must have felt insecure and vulnerable, which could have justified the firing of gunshots to intimidate the applicant’s acquaintances. However, acts of self-defence against his acquaintances could not justify inflicting serious injuries on the applicant, who was not threatening the physical integrity of the police officers. The applicant was hospitalized for five days and was expected to convalesce for 18-21 days, whereas the three police officers were admitted to hospital late on 23 December and discharged the next day.
Concerning the applicant’s allegations, which were corroborated by the medical reports, and the circumstances in which he sustained those injuries, the Court found that the Government had not explained or justified the degree of force used against the applicant. The State was therefore responsible for the inhuman and degrading treatment to which he was subjected while in the charge of the police, in violation of Article 3.
Having reached that conclusion, and since the Court was not able to establish the relevant facts, the Court did not consider it necessary to examine the applicant’s allegations regarding the conduct of the police officers inside Toumba Police Station.

Concerning the investigation

The Court observed that there were some discrepancies capable of undermining the reliability and effectiveness of the administrative investigation and a selective and somewhat inconsistent approach to the assessment of evidence by the investigating authority, which omitted to take into account the report of the applicant’s forensic medical examination.
As regards the judicial proceedings, the Court noted, among other things, that the judicial investigation was only launched after the applicant had lodged a criminal complaint. Neither prosecutor questioned personally the eyewitnesses or the applicant and the police officers. Both prosecutors relied heavily on the police officers’ depositions and discredited the eyewitness evidence and the results of the applicant’s forensic examination.

The Court therefore concluded that there had been a further violation of Article 3 in that both investigations into the alleged ill-treatment were ineffective.

Article 13
The Court considered that there was no need to examine separately the applicant’s complaint under Article 13.

Article 14
The Court considered that, while the police officers’ conduct during the applicant’s arrest called for serious criticism, that behaviour was not of itself a sufficient basis for concluding that the treatment inflicted on the applicant by the police was racially motivated.

Having assessed all relevant elements, the Court did not consider that it had been established beyond reasonable doubt that racist attitudes played a role in the applicant’s treatment by the police. Accordingly, that complaint had to be rejected as manifestly ill-founded

The Court’s judgements are accessible on its Internet site.

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The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights.

1 Under Article 43 of the Convention, within three months from the date of a Chamber judgement, any party to the case may, in exceptional cases, request that the case be referred to the 17-member Grand Chamber of the Court. In that event, a panel of five judges considers whether the case raises a serious question affecting the interpretation or application of the Convention or its protocols, or a serious issue of general importance, in which case the Grand Chamber will deliver a final judgement. If no such question or issue arises, the panel will reject the request, at which point the judgment becomes final. Otherwise Chamber judgements become final on the expiry of the three-month period or earlier if the parties declare that they do not intend to make a request to refer.

2 This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.

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