Постановление Европейского суда по правам человека от 01.07.2010 «Дело Никифоров (Nikiforov) против России» [англ.]

nt of the seriousness of those acts that the pain and suffering were inflicted on him intentionally, with the view to extracting from him a confession to having committed the offence of which he was suspected. In these circumstances, the Court concludes that, taken as a whole and having regard to its purpose and severity, the ill-treatment at issue amounted to torture within the meaning of Article 3 of the Convention.
47. Accordingly, there has been a violation of Article 3 under its substantive limb.

2. Compliance with Article 3 as regards
the effectiveness of the investigation

48. The Court reiterates that where an individual raises an arguable claim that he has been seriously ill-treated in breach of Article 3, that provision requires by implication that there should be an effective official investigation. For the investigation to be regarded as "effective", it should in principle be capable of leading to the establishment of the facts of the case and to the identification and punishment of those responsible. This is not an obligation of result, but one of means. The investigation into serious allegations of ill-treatment must be thorough. This means that the authorities must always make a serious attempt to find out what happened and should not rely on hasty or ill-founded conclusions to close their investigation or as the basis of their decisions (see Assenov and Others v. Bulgaria, 28 October 1998, § 103 et seq., Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1998-VIII). They must take the reasonable steps available to them to secure the evidence concerning the incident, including, inter alia, eyewitness testimony, forensic evidence, and so on. Any deficiency in the investigation which undermines its ability to establish the cause of injuries or the identity of the persons responsible will risk falling foul of this standard, and a requirement of promptness and reasonable expedition is implicit in this context (see, among many authorities, Mikheyev v. Russia, No. 77617/01, § 107 et seq., 26 January 2006, and Assenov, cited above, § 102 et seq.). Further, the investigation must be expedient. The Court has often assessed whether the authorities reacted promptly to the complaints at the relevant time (see Labita v. Italy [GC], No. 26772/95, § 133 et seq., ECHR 2000-IV). It has also given consideration to the promptness in opening investigations, delays in taking statements and to the length of time taken for the initial inquiry (see Indelicato v. Italy, No. 31143/96, § 37, 18 October 2001).
49. The Government submitted that the investigation had been sufficiently thorough. The investigators had obtained statements from many witnesses, including the police officers, the forensic expert, the supervising prosecutor, the applicant himself, the applicant's family members and co-detainees, and examined the detention records and registration logs from Nerekhta district police station. The inquiry had been completed within the time-limits established by Russian law. However, no criminal case had been instituted because there had been insufficient evidence of the police officers' involvement in the alleged beatings.
50. The applicant pointed out that he had lodged a criminal complaint on 30 December 2003. However, the medical examination had not been completed until two months later, on 19 February 2004. The criminal case had not been instituted and a confrontation between him and the police officers had not been arranged. In his view, the inquiry had been too long and ineffective.
51. The Court considers that medical evidence of damage to the applicant's health, together with his allegations of having been beaten by the police, amounted to an "arguable claim" of ill-treatment. Accordingly, the authorities had an obligation to carry out an effective investigation into the circumstances of the alleged ill-treatment.
52. The forensi

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