7.  The Russian Federal Prison Service (“the FSIN”) transports prisoners across its network of nearly 300 remand prisons and equivalent facilities, eight prisons for convicted offenders, and more than 800 correctional facilities and penal settlements (колония-поселение). Together with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, it operates a large fleet of railway carriages and prison vans manned by officers from the convoy department.
8.  The general conditions of transport, as transpires from the material submitted by the parties, may be described as follows.
9.  Special railway carriages for transporting prisoners have a solid metal body mounted on the chassis of a regular passenger carriage. There are four basic models. All have five large compartments and, in addition, four (models nos. 512 and 519) or three (models nos. 824 and 4500) small compartments. The passenger capacity is set out in the “Guidance for equipping penal facilities with security and surveillance systems” (Order no. 279 issued by the Ministry of Justice on 4 September 2006, later replaced by Order no. 94 of 17 June 2013, Annex, point 6.2) and in the Conveyance Instruction (see paragraph 67 below). The measurements based on the technical specifications were given in the Supreme Court’s decisions (see paragraph 69 below).
10.  A large compartment is the same size as a standard Russian passenger compartment designed for four people. It is two metres deep and one and a half metres wide. The prison version of the compartment is fitted with six and a half sleeping places. Six bunks, 60 centimetres wide by 2 metres long, are placed three on each side. A shorter seventh bunk, 50 centimetres wide and 1.6 metres long, bridges the gap between the two middle bunks. The “bridge” bunk makes it impossible to stand upright in the compartment. According to the Conveyance Instruction, a large compartment is suitable for transporting up to twelve people on long‑distance journeys or up to sixteen people for short distances. Counsel for the FSIN explained in the proceedings before the Supreme Court (see paragraph 69 below) the manner in which sixteen people were accommodated in a large compartment: five prisoners seated on each of the two lower bunks, one prisoner lying on each of the two upper bunks, and four people seated on the middle bunks joined together with the bridge bunk. In 2012, the Supreme Court held that the occupancy limits established in the Conveyance Instruction for long-distance journeys were incompatible with international law (see paragraph 69 below).
11.  Small compartments are two metres deep and one metre wide. They are fitted with three bunks on one side. It is permissible to use them for accommodating up to five people on a long journey or six people on a short journey.
12.  Compartments have no windows or inside lighting. Any light comes through a sliding barred door leading to the corridor where guards are stationed.
13.  Neither mattresses nor bedding is provided. Apart from bunk beds, compartments have no other fixtures or storage space for prisoners’ baggage.
14.  A flush toilet is located at the end of the carriage. It is prohibited to use it when the train is stationary or moving within the perimeter of the sanitary protection zone surrounding a railway station.
15.  Prison vans are used to transport prisoners to and from train stations and also between remand prisons, courts and police wards. They have a van chassis, on which a solid metal body is mounted. The most common brands are GAZ-3307 and 3309 vans with many variants featuring a different number of single- and multi-prisoner cells. Their measurements are set out in vehicle type approval certificates, which were examined in the domestic proceedings (see paragraph 69 below), appended to the Government’s submissions in application no. 63058/10, and also listed in point 6.2 of the appendix to the above-mentioned Order no. 94 of 17 June 2013.
16.  The prisoner area of the van has security hatches in the roof but no windows. Prisoners and guards board the van through a back or side door. A central aisle opens onto a guards’ area with cushioned seats for convoy officers and a heating unit. The prisoner area is 1.55 to 1.70 metres high.
17.  A single-prisoner cubicle, commonly referred to by its Russian vernacular name “stakan” (“a drinking glass”), is a solid metal isolation box that is 65 centimetres deep and 50 centimetres wide with one seat inside. Single-prisoner cubicles are used to transport prisoners who belong to a “special category”, such as female offenders or former police officers, and as such must be isolated from others (see point 168 of the Conveyance Instruction in paragraph 66 below). These cubicles have a solid metal body and doors with a peephole and small air holes.
18.  Multi-prisoner cells are 1.15 to 1.20 metres deep. They are fitted with two benches facing each other. As per Order no. 94, the occupancy rate in multi-prisoner cells correlates to the length of the bench at a ratio of 45 centimetres per person. Nine or ten-person cells in Gaz and Zil vans are 2.25 to 2.35 metres long; eighteen-person cells in Ural and Kamaz vans are 3.70 metres long. Those cells may have either solid or barred doors.
19.  Mr Aleksey Gennadyevich Tomov was born in 1966 and lives in the village of Vylgort in the Komi Republic.
20.  From 2004 to 2009 Mr Tomov served a custodial sentence in high‑security correctional facility IK-22 in Vorkuta. In August 2009, the Vorkuta Town Court amended his sentence, changing the type of facility to a penal settlement. Accordingly, the authorities decided to transfer him to the KP-52 settlement located in the village of Vetyu in the Knyazhpogostskiy district of the Komi Republic. The nearest city was Yemva, which is located some 900 kilometres away from Vorkuta.
21.  The transfer to Yemva began by prison van on 19 September 2009. Mr Tomov and three other detainees were placed in a multi-prisoner cell of a Gaz-3307 van. On its way to the railway station, the van called at the Vorkuta remand prison, where more prisoners were placed on board, bringing the total number of people to ten. The journey to the station took two and a half hours.
22.  The transfer continued by train, along the railway line connecting Vorkuta with Yemva via Pechora and Usinsk.
23.  On the journey between Vorkuta and Usinsk Mr Tomov shared a large compartment with nine people. That part of the transfer began at 5 p.m. on 19 September and ended at 11.30 a.m. the following day. It lasted nineteen hours with a four-hour stop at Pechora.
24.  After a four-hour stop at Usinsk and until their arrival at the destination in Yemva, Mr Tomov shared a small compartment with three people during the second leg of the journey, which lasted from 4.10 p.m. on 20 September until 12.45 p.m. on 21 September, for a total of twenty-one hours with another six-hour stop at Pechora.
25.  Prisoners were allowed to visit the toilet two or three times a day. Using the toilet during stops was prohibited.
26.  Ms Yuliya Vadimovna Punegova was born in 1985 and lives in Syktyvkar.
27.  On 25 and 27 January and 1 and 18 February 2010, in the framework of a pre-trial investigation, she was taken by prison van to the town court, a forensic facility, a remand centre and a hospital. The trips in January lasted three minutes each way, those in February thirty minutes.
28.  According to Ms Punegova, in March, May, July and September 2010 she was also taken to the town court where hearings concerning the matter of her pre-trial detention were held.
29.  After the opening of the trial before the Supreme Court of the Komi Republic, she was shuttled between the remand prison and the trial court on ten or twelve occasions between 15 December 2010 and 24 February 2011. The distance was sixteen kilometres and the travel time thirty-five minutes.
30.  Each time, Ms Punegova was placed in a single-prisoner cubicle inside Gaz and Kavz vans. In the winter months she suffered greatly from the cold because the heating unit was located in the central aisle, while the solid metal door of her cell prevented warm air from circulating. The outside temperature varied between minus 11 and minus 28 degrees Celsius.
31.  Ms Natalya Borisovna Kostromina was born in 1978 and lives in Syktyvkar. She states that she suffers from obesity caused by diabetes.
32.  In June 2010 investigators in Komi asked the prison service to arrange for her transfer from the correctional facility in Kineshma where she was serving her sentence to a remand prison in Syktyvkar.
33.  The transfer began on 25 June 2010 and ended on 18 July 2010. Ms Kostromina transited through remand prisons in Ivanovo, Yaroslavl and Sosnogorsk. She was taken in a prison van from remand centres to railway stations on seven occasions, with each trip lasting one to two hours.
34.  Each time Ms Kostromina was placed in a single-prisoner cubicle in a Gaz prison van, together with another detainee, N., who was also in transit from Kineshma to Syktyvkar. Ms Kostromina’s suffering was aggravated on account of her obesity and unusually hot summer temperatures.
35.  In his letter of 6 June 2011 to a member of the public monitoring commission, the deputy head of the Yaroslavl prison service explained that Ms Kostromina and Ms N. had been placed together in the single-prisoner cubicle in order to isolate them from male offenders.
36.  Mr Yevgeniy Nikolayevich Rakov was born in 1969 in Vladivostok.
37.  Pursuant to an order issued by the Primorskiy Regional Court, Mr Rakov was to be transferred from the facility where he was serving his sentence to a remand prison in Vladivostok, located 200 kilometres away.
38.  At about 4 p.m. on 21 February 2011 Mr Rakov, together with twelve other prisoners, was taken to the Nakhodka railway station and placed in a large compartment of a railway carriage. Prisoners were not allowed to use the toilet until approximately 8 p.m. The wait was particularly difficult for Mr Rakov, who suffered from chronic prostatitis. Upon arriving at Ussuriysk station, the railway carriage was left overnight on a siding with the prisoners locked inside the compartment without access to water or a toilet. They had to urinate into plastic bags or bottles and stash them under the lower bunk. The train arrived at Vladivostok station at about noon the following day, but the prisoners had to wait until 7.30 p.m. until vans were ready to take them to the remand prison. No water or toilet access was authorised during the wait.  The transfer ended at 9 p.m. on 22 February 2011.
39.  Mr Rakov complained about the conditions of his transfer to various authorities and also to a court of general jurisdiction, seeking compensation for non-pecuniary damage.
40.  On 12 April 2011 the Primorskiy regional prosecutor’s office replied that they had questioned the guards who had been on duty on 21 and 22 February and established that the number of prisoners in the compartment had not exceeded the norm. Hot water had been distributed between 8.10 p.m. and 8.20 p.m. on 21 February 2011. On the following day no hot water had been distributed because the prisoners had finished their dry rations the previous night. Toilet visits had been authorised from 9.10 p.m. to 10.40 p.m. on 21 February and from 10.10 a.m. to 11.00 a.m. on 22 February. The prosecutor concluded that the guards had not breached any regulations.
41.  On 22 April 2011 the FSIN replied to Mr Rakov that, following verification and having interviewed twenty-three prisoners, it had been established that he had been placed together with nine prisoners in a large compartment. The nine-hour wait at Ussuriysk had been accounted for by the schedule of passenger trains. The relevant sanitary regulations forbade the use of flush toilets of the type installed in prisoner carriages while the train was stationary or was passing through large stations. The FSIN determined that the guards had acted in compliance with the regulations and that the conditions of Mr Rakov’s transportation had not amounted to torture or inhuman treatment.
42.  In his statement of claim to the Sovetskiy District Court in Vladivostok, Mr Rakov designated Mr Shevchenko as his representative. The court informed him that the personal attendance of incarcerated litigants was not provided for by law and invited him to issue a power of attorney for Mr Shevchenko, which Mr Rakov did. On 30 May 2011 the District Court held a hearing, but Mr Shevchenko did not attend. Having heard oral submissions from representatives of the FSIN and the federal treasury, the court rejected Mr Rakov’s claim for compensation. The judgment restated the findings of the above-mentioned inquiry by the FSIN and endorsed its conclusion to the effect that there had been no breach of Mr Rakov’s rights.
43.  Mr Rakov lodged an appeal. He listed Mr Shevchenko as his representative and also sought leave to appear in person. On 12 July 2011 the Primorskiy Regional Court rejected the appeal in a summary decision, without hearing Mr Rakov or his representative.
44.  Mr Dmitriy Lvovich Vasilyev was born in 1958 and lives in Pechora. From 2007 to 2013 he served a custodial sentence in the IK‑54 correctional facility in the Sverdlovsk Region.
45.  At about 11 p.m. on 10 November 2012 Mr Vasilyev and seven other detainees were loaded into a multi-prisoner cell of a Gaz van. The detainees were in the van for one hour, first in transit to the railway station and later while they waited for the train to arrive.
46.  At about midnight Mr Vasilyev was transferred to a railway carriage, coupled to a passenger train bound for Yekaterinburg. During the eight-hour journey to Yekaterinburg, a two-hour wait in a siding at Yekaterinburg station and a two-hour wait for a police escort, Mr Vasilyev was kept together with between nine and thirteen other people in a large compartment.
47.  In Yekaterinburg, Mr Vasilyev and thirteen other prisoners were taken to the IZ-66/1 remand prison in a multi-prisoner cell of a Kamaz van. The journey ended at 1 p.m. on 11 November 2012 having lasted a total of fourteen hours.
48.  The return journey began at 5 p.m. on 24 November 2012, when Mr Vasilyev and thirteen other prisoners were taken to the railway station in a Kamaz prison van. They were held in a multi-prisoner cell during the two‑hour trip. Until 4 a.m. the following day, Mr Vasilyev was transported in a large compartment of a prisoner carriage, with between nine and eleven other people.
49.  At the destination, Mr Vasilyev and seven other prisoners were again loaded into a multi-prisoner cell of a Gaz van. They alighted one hour later at the penal facility. The total duration of the journey was in excess of twelve hours.
50.  Mr Tomov (for his personal details see paragraph 19 above), Mr Nikolay Konstantinovich Roshka, born in 1965 in Moldova, and Mr Nikita Valeryevich Barinov, born in 1990 in Syktyvkar, were in transit between the IZ-11/1 remand prison in Syktyvkar and the IK‑23 high‑security penal facility in the Murmansk Region. It was a journey of approximately 2,200 kilometres.
51.  From 3.30 p.m. to 5 p.m. on 18 December 2015 the three applicants and five other people were placed in a multi-prisoner cell of a Kamaz prison van and taken to Syktyvkar railway station. The same eight prisoners travelled in a large compartment of a prisoner carriage to Sosnogorsk via Ukhta, arriving at 7.30 p.m. the following day.
52.  After a three-night stay at the Sosnogorsk remand prison, in the morning of 22 December they were taken back to Ukhta railway station by prison van in which fourteen people shared a multi-prisoner cell. From 10 a.m. until 7.30 a.m. the following day, ten prisoners, including the applicants, travelled in a large compartment of a railway carriage from Ukhta to Vologda. That journey was followed by a transfer to the Vologda remand prison by van with nine people sharing a multi-prisoner cell. The transfer took one hour.
53.  The three applicants then spent almost three weeks in the Vologda remand prison.
54.  On 13 January 2016 the transfer resumed. From 3.40 p.m. to 5.40 p.m. fifteen prisoners, including the applicants, were placed in a multi‑prisoner cell of a Kamaz van and taken to Vologda station.
55.  From 5.40 p.m. on 13 January until 8.10 a.m. on 16 January a total of twelve people were transferred from Vologda to Olenegorsk in the Murmansk Region. They were held in a large compartment of a prisoner railway carriage. During a fifteen-hour stop in St Petersburg on 14 January, the temperature fell to minus 20 degrees Celsius, but the heating did not function because the prisoner carriage was stationary. The prisoners were allowed two toilet visits per day and given three pots of hot water per day.
56.  Lastly, from 8.10 a.m. until 10.10 a.m. on 16 January, fourteen prisoners, including the applicants, were transferred to the penal facility in a multi-prisoner cell of a Kamaz van.
57.  Mr Rakov challenged point 167 of the Conveyance Instruction (see paragraph 67 below), claiming that the excessively high normative capacity of railway carriages led to overcrowding and deprived prisoners of a proper night’s rest.
58.  On 13 October 2011 the Supreme Court of Russia rejected the challenge, finding that the instruction had been issued by the competent authority and did not contradict any hierarchically superior regulations. The normative capacity conformed to the technical specifications of railway carriages and to health and safety regulations. There was no indication that such conditions could be constitutive of torture or inhuman treatment which, in the Supreme Court’s view, must involve deliberate infliction of pain or suffering.
59.  Mr Rakov appealed, complaining in particular that the impugned document had not been published and had been classified “for service use only”.
60.  On 27 December 2011 the Appeals Panel of the Supreme Court rejected the appeal in a summary fashion.
61.  Relying on the Court’s case-law, Mr Tomov and Mr Vasilyev challenged Order no. 279 (see paragraph 9 above), complaining that the normative occupancy rates laid down in the Order were excessively high and necessarily led to overcrowding.
62.  On 16 November 2015 the Supreme Court rejected the challenge, finding as follows:
“The plaintiffs’ argument that the measurements of cells in prisoner vans and railway carriages, as established in the guidance, are incompatible with the requirements of international law are unfounded because no other normative act of a higher legal order provides for different cell measurements in those conveyances.
The plaintiffs’ claim that the technical specifications of the guidance are in breach of the case-law of the European Court in the cases of Khudoyorov v. Russia, Guliyev v. Russia, and Idalov v. Russia in the part concerning the conditions of transfer by road and by rail, is erroneous because it does not correspond to the contents [of those judgments].”
63.  On 25 February 2016 the Appeals Panel of the Supreme Court rejected their appeal in a summary fashion.