On 19 July 2018 the European Court of Human Rights, sitting as a Chamber delivered its judgment regarding the case of Hovhannisyan v. Armenia (application no. 18419/13), finding a violation of Article 3 (prohibition of torture) of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The applicant complained that her superiors deliberately ill-treated and humiliated her and that the authorities failed to carry out an effective investigation into her allegations, as prescribed by Article 3 of the Convention.
The Court noted that in the present case, since the applicant raised before the competent domestic authorities an arguable claim that she was ill-treated, no investigation was ever launched, nor was any internal investigation conducted within the Ministry of Environmental Protection. During the inquiry, the domestic authorities did not make any serious attempts to find out what had happened. Thus, there has been a violation of Article 3 of the Convention under its procedural head. As regards to the substantive head of Article 3, the Court relying on the Government’s observation found that there has been no violation.
The applicant claimed overall EUR 10,510 for non-pecuniary damage and the costs and expenses. The European Court has held that the respondent State is to pay the applicant overall EUR 3000 as compensation for non-pecuniary damage, dismissing the remainder of the applicant’s claim for just satisfaction.
