Last Updated on April 5, 2022 by LawEuro
Information Note on the Court’s case-law 261
April 2022
Nana Muradyan v. Armenia – 69517/11
Judgment 5.4.2022 [Section IV]
Article 2
Positive obligations
Article 2-1
Life
No measures to protect life of conscript who committed suicide, against backdrop of harassment, monetary disputes and discouragement of reporting misconduct in his military unit: violation
Facts – The applicant is the mother of V. Muradyan who died at the age of 18, allegedly by suicide, during his compulsory military service in a military unit in the “Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh”. She complains about the death of her son and that the domestic authorities had failed to carry out an effective investigation into the matter.
Law – Article 2:
(a) Admissibility –
Exhaustion of domestic remedies – A civil claim for compensation under Article 162.1 of the Civil Code for non-pecuniary damage could not have provided sufficient redress to the applicant. In particular, having regard to the ceiling prescribed by 1087.2 § 7 (1) of the Civil Code of AMD 3,000,000 (approximately EUR 6,000) on the amount of compensation for non-pecuniary damage that could be potentially awarded for a breach of the right to life, in the circumstances of the present case the compensation that could have been awarded by the civil courts was not in reasonable proportion to any award the Court might have made under Article 41 of the Convention in respect of comparable violations of Article 2.
Conclusion: preliminary objection dismissed (unanimously)
(b) Merits –
(i) Substantive limb – The applicant’s son had been a conscript carrying out his mandatory military service under the care and responsibility of the authorities when he had died allegedly by suicide. There was no evidence in the material before the Court to support the hypothesis that his life had been taken intentionally as claimed by the applicant. Any allegation that he had been murdered would thus be purely speculative.
According to the findings of the investigation and the charges brought against two of the former servicemen, the applicant’s son had committed suicide as a consequence of harassment by his fellow servicemen. It was established during the investigation that he had been subjected to abuse (physical and psychological violence) at the hands of more senior conscripts and junior command staff within the first few months of starting service. In addition, aside from hazing and harassment by more powerful recruits or junior command staff, relations between servicemen constantly involved monetary issues and frequent disagreements in that regard. The applicant’s son, on the day of his death, had been involved in such a disagreement concerning the repayment of a debt owed by him to one of the servicemen. While the Court could not speculate whether the command staff’s ignorance of the incidents of harassment (and even physical violence) and the existence of non-statutory relations among servicemen had been due to their own omission or even indifference, it was clear that the environment in the military unit had been such that junior officers had been discouraged from reporting misconduct. It was also unclear whether the command staff had been reprimanded for the events that took place specifically on the day of the incident or for their failure to maintain discipline and morale in the military unit in general.
It appeared from the material before the Court that the command of the military unit had failed to adopt practical measures to ensure that signals of bullying and mistreatment in the military unit under their responsibility were effectively reviewed. Further, due to the unhealthy environment in the military unit, reporting misconduct appeared to have been in fact discouraged.
The domestic authorities had been required to adopt practical measures aimed at effectively protecting conscripts against the dangers inherent in military life and appropriate procedures for identifying the shortcomings and errors likely to be committed in that regard by those in charge at different levels. They had also been required to secure high professional standards among regular soldiers to protect conscripts. They had, however, failed to fulfil those obligations in the present case.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously)
(ii) Procedural limb – There had been a number of elements which had seriously impaired the effectiveness of the investigation. These included failures in collecting important forensic evidence during the first months of the investigation; an absence of adequate explanations for certain injuries noted in the autopsy report, a lack of thoroughness in investigating the disagreements between the servicemen involved and their conduct as well the actions and omissions of the command staff of the military unit on the day of V. Muradyan’s death; a failure to assess newly emerged evidence concerning the abuse he had been subjected to since he had been drafted in conjunction with the events on the day of his death and his severely depressed psychological state. Moreover, it was unclear why charges had only been brought against two of the three servicemen implicated in the events preceding his death. Lastly, the investigation, as also acknowledged by the Court of General Jurisdiction of Yerevan, had been unreasonably lengthy and in breach of the requirements of Article 2. According to the information provided by the Government on 1 July 2020, the investigation had still been pending on that date and had thus until then lasted for more than ten years and three months after V. Muradyan’s death. No highly convincing and plausible reasons had been provided by the Government to justify this delay.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously)
Article 41: EUR 20,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage.
(See also Kılınç and Others v. Turkey, 40145/98, 7 June 2005; Abdullah Yılmaz v. Turkey, 21899/02, 17 June 2008, Legal Summary; Mosendz v. Ukraine, 52013/08, 17 January 2013, Legal Summary)
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