Suffocation in order to distract the applicant’sconfession consists of inhuman and degrading treatment.
JUDGMENT
Morgunov v. Russia 11-04-2017 (no. 32546/08)
SUMMARY
Inhuman and degrading treatment. Confession of the accused by virtual “drowning” him . The applicant, who was convicted of robbery, complained that during his temporary detention the police officers forced him to confess through virtual drowning, placing him a suffocating gas mask and a plastic bag on his face, hanging him in parallel rods and hitting him with a baseball bat. The Court found a violation of Article 3 of the Convention.
PROVISION
Article 3
PRINCIPAL FACTS
The applicant, Aleksandr Ivanovich Morgunov, is a Russian national who was born in 1969 and lives in Orenburg (Russia). The case concerned an allegation of police brutality.
In August 2006 Mr Morgunov was arrested by the Department for Combating Organised Crime of Orenburg regional police (“the UBOP”), on suspicion of having committed robberies. According to Mr Morgunov, he was later taken out of pre-trial detention to the UBOP building, where five or six police officers forced him to confess by shackling him, almost suffocating him with a gas mask and plastic bag, hanging him up on parallel bars, and beating him with a baseball bat. A routine medical examination on the same day recorded numerous injuries, consisting of haematomas and
hyperaemias. Mr Morgunov requested that the officers be prosecuted, but the request was refused by the district prosecutor’s office as it held that Mr Morgunov’s injuries could have been selfinflicted. The domestic courts then upheld the decision taken by the district prosecutor’s office. In March 2008 the court which convicted Mr Morgunov of robbery and sentenced him to 12 years and four months’ imprisonment also dismissed his allegations of ill-treatment as ill-founded.
THE DECISION OF THE COURT
Relying on Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment), Mr Morgunov complained of being beaten by police officers whilst in their custody and of the ineffective investigation into his complaint.
Violation of Article 3 (inhuman and degrading treatment)
Violation of Article 3 (investigation)
Just satisfaction: EUR 20,000 (non-pecuniary damage) and EUR 800 (costs and expenses)
