Background
Gela Tchigladze was arrested during the dispersal of a demonstration in Tbilisi on 21 June 2019. His administrative arrest report recorded a scratch, a bruise and scabs. He was later fined for disorderly conduct and disobeying or insulting police officers, although the appellate court reduced the fine.
Tchigladze alleged that police beat him with truncheons during his arrest. Medical material later recorded bruising, a haematoma and post-traumatic stress disorder. The appellate court forwarded his ill-treatment allegation to prosecutors in August 2019. The ensuing investigation obtained medical documents and conducted an investigative experiment, but relevant surveillance footage was unavailable and key witnesses, including arresting officers, were not questioned until 2021.
The Court’s Holding
The Court unanimously held that Georgia violated the procedural limb of Article 3. Because injuries had been recorded at the time of arrest, the authorities had a duty to investigate their origin of their own motion. Instead, meaningful action followed only after the appellate court referred the allegation. The delay contributed to the loss of potentially relevant camera footage, and the nearly two-year delay in questioning witnesses further undermined the investigation.
The Court found no substantive violation of Article 3. Given the deficiencies in the domestic inquiry and inconsistencies in Tchigladze’s own accounts of where and how he was arrested, the available evidence did not establish beyond reasonable doubt that he had been ill-treated as alleged. It also rejected his Article 6 complaint about the reasoning for his administrative-offence conviction as manifestly ill-founded.
Key Takeaways
- Recorded injuries on arrest trigger an ex officio duty to investigate their origin promptly.
- Delayed investigative steps that lead to lost video evidence and late witness questioning can render an Article 3 investigation ineffective.
- Investigative shortcomings do not, by themselves, establish that alleged ill-treatment occurred where the evidence cannot prove it beyond reasonable doubt.
Why It Matters
The judgment distinguishes sharply between the State’s procedural duty to conduct an effective investigation and the separate question whether police ill-treatment has been proved. Georgia was liable for the former even though the Court could not make a substantive finding that officers beat Tchigladze.
The ruling also reinforces the importance of immediate evidence preservation in protest-policing cases, particularly where surveillance footage and prompt witness accounts may be decisive.