CASE OF LAZĂR v. ROMANIA
Violation of Article 3 - Prohibition of torture (Article 3 - Degrading treatment) (Substantive aspect)
Iulia Motoc;Marko Bošnjak;Paulo Pinto De Albuquerque
4. The applicant was born in 1971. He is currently serving a sentence in a prison in Panama. 5. Following an undercover operation set up by the police with the help of two undercover agents, the applicant and a Dutch national, V.D.P., were arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking. 6. In November 2002, the prosecutor’s office attached to the Timişoara Court of Appeal committed the applicant and his co-accused for trial for drug trafficking and the case was registered with the Arad County Court. 7. The applicant’s counsel asked the court to hear evidence from the undercover agents. His request was refused on the ground that the anonymity of the undercover agents was protected. 8. Following another request lodged by the applicant’s counsel, on 5 March 2003 the court ordered the prosecutor to submit the authorisations it had issued for the undercover operation. 9. The applicant’s counsel claimed that his client had committed the drug offence only after being incited to do so by the undercover police agents. 10. On 9 April 2003 the Arad County Court convicted the applicant of drug trafficking and sentenced him to three years’ imprisonment. The County Court imposed a lenient sentence in the light of the applicant’s good behavior after his arrest and the fact that he had pleaded guilty as charged. The court based his conviction on the report drafted by the undercover agents after the applicant had been caught red-handed, as well as a search report and the statements given by the applicant and his co-accused. 11. The applicant appealed, complaining, inter alia, that the undercover agent had overstepped the legitimate limits of investigation by inciting him to sell drugs. 12. By a decision delivered on 25 June 2003 the Timişoara Court of Appeal increased his prison sentence to ten years’ imprisonment. It held that the good behaviour of the applicant after he had committed the offence could not justify a lenient sentence. 13. The applicant lodged an appeal on points of law. In his grounds for appeal he did not complain about the unlawfulness of his conviction but only about the length of his sentence. He requested the appellate court to impose a milder sentence and accordingly, to overturn the decision of the Timisoara Court of Appeal and to uphold the judgment of the Arad County Court by which he had been convicted to only three years’ imprisonment. 14. By a final decision delivered on 27 November 2003, the Supreme Court of Justice dismissed the applicant’s appeal on points of law as unfounded. 15. The applicant was detained in Jilava Prison between 25 July 2003 and 6 January 2004. 16. The applicant alleged that he had been kept in poor hygienic conditions in overcrowded cells. The water provided had been of very poor quality, being of a yellow colour, smelling and containing worms. Sometimes, there had been no water – either for drinking or for the toilet. The food had also been of very poor quality. 17. The Government contended that the records held by the prison authorities concerning the cells’ size and their occupancy rate were no longer available as the archives for that period had been destroyed, pursuant to the domestic law. However, as regards the general detention conditions in Jilava Prison the Government submitted that every cell had been equipped with two squat toilets connected to the water network and separated from the rest of the room by a wall. It had been possible to let in fresh air by opening the window to each cell. The prisoners had been allowed to take one hot shower per week in the communal bathrooms located in each section of the prison (between nineteen and twenty-three showers had been available). The applicant had been allowed to walk outside his cell for thirty minutes each day.