4.  The applicant was born in 1955 and is currently serving a prison sentence in Dnipro.
5.  On 20 December 2005 a panel of judges and lay assessors of the Odesa Regional Court of Appeal, sitting as a first-instance court, found the applicant and eighteen other persons guilty of different crimes which they had committed as a gang in the Odesa Region between 1995 and 1999, including banditry, illegal possession of firearms, theft, robbery, burglary, infliction of bodily injuries and murder. The applicant was sentenced to fifteen years’ imprisonment with confiscation of property. The applicant’s conviction was based mainly on his co-defendant’s statements incriminating the applicant and on the fact that a number of objects stolen by the gang had been found in the applicant’s wife’s home during a search on 2 October 1999.
6.  The trial court dismissed the applicant’s allegations that he had been ill-treated by the police at the pre-trial stage of proceedings, having relied essentially on the information provided by the prosecutor’s office, which had previously rejected the applicant’s complaint of ill-treatment as unsubstantiated, and by the authorities of the pre-trial detention centre, in which the applicant had been detained at the material time, that he had not had any injuries.
7.  Before and during the trial the applicant was assisted by different lawyers. The court-appointed lawyer, who represented the applicant during the trial, had his fees paid by the State.
8.  During the investigation and trial the applicant either refused to give any statements concerning the charges against him or denied that he had committed any crimes. During the trial he stated that he had an alibi and requested the trial court to summon a person who could testify that in June 1998 the applicant had been living in another region of Ukraine and therefore had committed no crime in the Odesa Region during that period. That request was refused, as were two other requests, in which the applicant and his lawyer asked the trial court to summon other persons without indicating the charges which their requests concerned or explaining the importance of those persons’ testimony.
9.  According to the applicant, the presiding judge on the panel of the Court of Appeal dealing with his case had not been impartial, as allegedly he and the investigator in the case had studied together at the same law school and one of the witnesses had been the judge’s relative. The applicant provided no document in that regard.
10.  Allegedly in protest to the unlawful manner in which his case was heard by the first-instance court, on 20 May 2005 the applicant stitched up his lips together and went on hunger strike. In this connection, the applicant underwent a medical examination, according to which he had no mental illness.
II.  THE APPLICANT’S APPEAL AGAINST HIS CONVICTION
11.  In order to prepare an appeal against his conviction, the applicant asked the Court of Appeal to give him time to study the case file which consisted of 171 volumes. The applicant’s request was granted and he was given the file to study on many occasions between March 2006 and February 2007. Allegedly that period was too short and sometimes the applicant had to study the case file together with several other convicts in one cell. Consequently, he did not familiarize himself with the entire case file.
12.  On 17 March 2006 the applicant lodged his initial appeal with the Supreme Court, challenging the judgment of 20 December 2005. On 23 July 2007 he amended his appeal. The applicant mainly argued that his conviction had been based on false evidence. He also complained that the first-instance court had been biased and that it had unlawfully refused to summon witnesses upon his and his lawyer’s requests.
13.  In July 2006 the applicant asked the Court of Appeal to appoint a lawyer to assist him in the preparation of his appeal and in the proceedings before the Supreme Court, as he had no money to hire a lawyer. A judge of that court replied to the applicant that he had to request the local bar association to appoint him a lawyer. The applicant lodged a similar request with the Odesa bar association. On 7 September 2006 he received a reply from the bar association that a decision to appoint a lawyer could be taken by the Court of Appeal. The applicant resubmitted his request for free legal assistance to the Court of Appeal, but it remained unanswered. The applicant complained of the fact that no lawyer had been appointed to him in his amended appeal to the Supreme Court (see paragraph 12 above).
14.  On 30 October 2007 the Supreme Court, having heard the applicant’s and his co-defendants’ appeals, found that the trial had been held in compliance with the procedure and that the first-instance court’s findings of fact had been based on sufficient evidence. While upholding the applicant’s sentence, the Supreme Court partly changed the applicant’s conviction. In particular, the charges of theft were excluded as not based on the correct application of law.
15.  In March 2006 the applicant lodged the present application with the Court, while he was being detained at Odesa Pre-Trial Detention Centre (“the SIZO”) since August 2001.
16.  According to the applicant, the SIZO authorities persecuted him in that connection. In particular, on 22 November 2007 he was allegedly beaten by the SIZO guards and sustained a head injury. The applicant was given no medical assistance as regards his injury and was placed in an isolation cell until 21 December 2007. Between 22 November and 21 December 2007 the applicant allegedly could not sent letters to the Court.
17.  On 21 December 2007 the applicant was transferred to Dnipropetrovsk Correctional Colony (“the prison”) to serve his sentence. In the prison, copies of different documents from his criminal case file were taken from him and put in his prison file. The applicant stated, without providing any further details, that the dispatch of his letters to the Court had been often blocked or delayed by the prison authorities and that he had not been allowed to make phone calls to his relatives.
18.  The Government submitted to the Court copies of several reports of the SIZO authorities concerning the applicant’s detention, according to which the applicant had been under special supervision as he had been considered inclined to commit self-mutilation (see also paragraph 10 above). On 22 November 2011 the applicant insulted several guards because they had opened and inspected a parcel which had been sent to him from outside the prison. He also hit his head against the wall in protest to the guards’ actions. Subsequently, the guards took the applicant for medical examination, which did not reveal any serious health issue. In connection with this incident the applicant was disciplined and placed in an isolation cell for fifteen days. On 7 December 2011 the applicant was disciplined and placed in an isolation cell for fourteen days for having insulted and threatened prison guards.
19.  The Government stated that the applicant’s letters had been duly dispatched by the SIZO and Prison authorities and that the Prison authorities had joined to those letters copies of the documents from his prison file which the applicant had asked them to send. They further stated that the applicant had had full access to his criminal case file during the proceedings against him and that he had been able to collect copies of all the documents he had needed for his application.