Conviction of an accused by the same judges who previously tried his co-accused with references to his guilt. Impartial court
JUDGMENT
Mucha and Slovakia 25.11.2021 (app. no. 63703/19)
SUMMARY
The case concerned the applicant’s conviction and sentencing to 23 years’ imprisonment for various
organised-crime activities, including violent offences. Part of the reasoning of the domestic courts
had been based on evidence testimony by accomplices who had turned State’s evidence following
plea-bargain agreements. The applicant’s conviction had been pronounced by the exact same threejudge bench as had adjudicated in the plea-bargain agreement convictions, and that bench recognised that those convictions were a part of the case against the applicant.
The Court found in particular that the earlier judgments had made it clear that the applicant had
been responsible for specific criminal actions. Given the role they had played in the applicant’s trial
before the same court, his doubts as to its impartiality were objectively justified.
PROVISION
Article 6
PRINCIPAL FACTS
The applicant, Pavel Mucha, is a Slovak national who was born in 1979 and is currently held in
Leopoldov Prison (Slovakia).
The applicant was a mid-level member of an organised criminal gang operating in Slovakia. In 2012
he and nine members of that organisation were charged with setting up, conceiving and maintaining
a criminal enterprise and with multiple violent offences. It was decided to prosecute eight of the
accused separately as they were ready to conclude plea-bargain agreements. Those agreements
were endorsed by the same three-judge bench of the Specialised Criminal Court in 2012 and 2013,
and the eight were found guilty and given custodial sentences, with minimal reasoning.
The plea-bargain agreements and the judgments made reference to Mr Mucha (whose name
appears initialised in the latter), including, among other things, the following details:
Mr Mucha had given instructions regarding the perpetration of various criminal activities; a
percentage of the gains from extortion had been handed over to him; he had issued “fines” to junior
gang members.
The Specialised Criminal Court tried Mr Mucha in 2013, finding him guilty on all charges and
sentencing him to 23 years’ imprisonment. The bench was the same as in the trials of his
accomplices. Two of the accomplices refused to give evidence, but the pre-trial submissions of one
of them were entered in the record. The convictions following the plea-bargain agreements were
considered “a factual and homogenous part of the case under examination” by the court in its
reasoning. Also included in the reasoning were the testimonies of six of his accomplices, and
documentary and expert evidence. The court noted that the witness testimony came mainly from individuals who had turned State’s evidence, but held that, combined with the other available evidence, this could not be outweighed by witnesses for Mr Mucha.
Mr Mucha later lodged an appeal, and appeal on points of law and a constitutional complaint, to no
avail. The Constitutional Court cited the subsidiarity principle and the Strasbourg Court’s judgments
in its reasoning.
Relying on Article 6 (right to a fair trial), the applicant complained that he had been denied a hearing
by an independent tribunal and denied the right to be presumed innocent.
THE DECISION OF THE COURT…
The Court noted that the applicant had not challenged the overall fairness of his trial – his complaint
rather concerned the fact that the same bench had convicted him as had convicted his accomplices
following their plea-bargain agreements and how that had affected the court’s impartiality and his
right to be presumed innocent.
Although the same bench had examined both the plea-bargain convictions and the applicant’s, the
Court noted that it had been made up of professional judges only, who should have been better able
to separate themselves from their findings in the earlier trials. Other evidence was presented in
court, and separate findings of fact and law were made.
However, the Court reiterated that the principle of the presumption of innocence would be violated
if a judicial decision or a statement made by a public official concerning a person charged with a
criminal offence reflected an opinion that he or she were guilty before that person had actually been
proved guilty under the law. It was nevertheless widely accepted across Europe that in complex
cases reference could be made to individuals’ involvement even if they too might be later tried.
Given the nature of the alleged offences in this case – involving criminal conspiracy – it had been
essential to refer to the actions of others. However, the references to the applicant had not been
worded in such a way as to make it clear that the applicant would later have his own trial and had
not as yet been found guilty. His participation in particular criminal activities had been specifically
defined. The trial court had had an incentive to follow the facts found in the previous cases, given
that it had previously convicted the applicant’s accomplices and had then elected to take their
convictions into account in the applicant’s trial as a part of the case against him. Those accomplices –
who had made plea-bargain agreements – on whose testimony the applicant’s conviction had in the
main been based, clearly had also had an incentive not to contradict their earlier statements.
The judgments in the co-conspirators’ cases had been clear prejudicial to the applicant’s case. Given
the role they had played in his own trial, which had taken place before the same court, his doubts as to its impartiality were objectively justified. The higher courts had had the power but had not rectified that flaw in the proceedings.
There had thus been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.
Just satisfaction (Article 41)
The Court held that Slovakia was to pay the applicant 7,800 euros (EUR) in respect of non-pecuniary
damage and EUR 630 in respect of costs and expenses.
