ts against the applicant under pressure from the police. The judge examined the allegation of ill-treatment and rejected it as unfounded. The judge thus allowed the reading out of his pre-trial depositions to the jury (see also paragraph 20 below).
19. The trial judge twice summoned Y. However, the subpoenas could not be served on her and were returned to the court because she did not live at the address which she had provided to the domestic authorities during the investigation. There was no information about her whereabouts; her next of kin were not aware of her new place of residence. Having excluded Y.'s statement made on 31 October 2000, the trial judge, however, allowed the reading out of her subsequent statements (see also paragraph 21 below).
20. In her summing-up to the jury on 16 October 2001, the trial judge reiterated the charges against the applicant and the evidence referred to by the parties and declared admissible. The judge explained to the jury that she had not been presented with any evidence indicating that Ov.'s testimony had been obtained under duress or otherwise in breach of law. Considering that the defence counsel had presented a distorted summary of the victims' injuries in his final speech, the judge reiterated the conclusions of the admissible expert reports. She also indicated to the jury that it was not their remit to decide on the putative self-defence issue.
21. After several hours of deliberations, the jury returned a guilty verdict on the charges of murder, robbery and destruction of property. On 17 October 2001 the trial judge held the final hearing concerning civil claims, the sentence and other matters to be determined by the trial judge. Y. appeared before the trial judge on that day and explained that she had not received any court summons, which had been sent to her mother's home address. Her mother was unaware of her new place of residence. Having learnt about the trial the day before, she decided to come to the courthouse (see also paragraph 19 above). The trial judge allowed Y. to give her opinion concerning the applicant's personality in so far as this matter could be relevant to the sentence. On the same day, the applicant was sentenced to eighteen years' imprisonment and the confiscation of his property was ordered.
22. The applicant submitted objections to the trial verbatim record, considering inter alia that Y. had in fact explained to the trial judge that the investigator had wrongly noted her new home address as her work address. The trial judge, however, rejected those objections as untrue.
3. Appeal proceedings
23. The applicant and his counsel submitted appeals to the Supreme Court of Russia. They argued that there had been various defects in the pre-trial investigation, in particular as regards the right to legal assistance; they contested the quality of the evidence, including the expert opinions, and the trial judge's summing-up to the jury. The applicant's counsel S. asked to be notified of the date for the appeal hearing and the applicant asked to be brought to that hearing.
24. On 8 January 2002 the applicant requested the Regional Court to give him access to the case file in order to prepare his defence on appeal. On 1 February 2002 the Regional Court dismissed his request because Russian law did not vest in the accused a right to have access to the file in appeal proceedings. The applicant unsuccessfully renewed his request in February 2002.
25. On 22 February 2002 the judge rejected a request by the applicant to have the trial verbatim record amended. Having examined the trial transcript, on 18 March 2002 the applicant's counsel submitted a statement of appeal. A handwritten inscription by the trial judge contained the instruction that "all participants in the proceedings be made aware of that document".
26. O
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