Published on 23 May 2022

SECOND SECTION

Application no. 56096/18 Ion MOÅžU against the Republic of Moldova lodged on 15 November 2018 communicated on 3 May 2022

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

The application concerns the applicant’s alleged ill-treatment by the police while in detention and the failure to carry out an effective investigation into his allegation of ill-treatment.

The applicant was detained pending trial and was taken out of the prison in order to be brought to the prosecutor’s office. He alleges that he was taken to an office and beaten, suffered electric shocks and suffocation, in order to make him confess to a murder which he had not committed. The prosecution obtained medical evidence in the form of ecchymoses on his face and arms. Thereafter, on a number of occasions the applicant was escorted by officers of the same police department which he accused of having ill-treated him. He claims that on one such occasion his torturers entered the car and he, fearing a repeat of the ill-treatment, took out a razor blade and cut his own veins, thus provoking his immediate transportation to a medical unit. After two years of investigation (carried out by the same unit of the prosecutor’s office which was prosecuting the applicant), it was discontinued since he could have caused the injuries to himself.

The applicant complains of a breach of Article 3 of the Convention as a result of his ill-treatment and the failure to carry out an effective investigation.

QUESTION TO THE PARTIES

Has there been a violation of Article 3 of the Convention? In particular, was the applicant ill-treated while in detention? Did the authorities carry out an effective investigation into his allegation of ill-treatment? ( Bouyid v. Belgium [GC], no. 23380/09, §§ 81-134, ECHR 2015; and Trocin v. the Republic of Moldova , no. 23847/19, §§ 40-63, 16 March 2021)