FIFTH SECTIONCASE OF LOPATA AND OTHERS v. UKRAINE(Application no. 84210/17 and 23 others -see appended list)     JUDGMENT STRASBOURG10 December 2020    This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of Lopata and Others v. Ukraine,The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of: Ivana Jelić, President, Ganna Yudkivska, Arnfinn Bårdsen, judges,and Liv Tigerstedt, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,Having deliberated in private on 19 November 2020,Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:PROCEDURE1. The case originated in applications against Ukraine lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on the various dates indicated in the appended table.2. The Ukrainian Government (“the Government”) were given notice of the applications.THE FACTS3. The list of applicants and the relevant details of the applications are set out in the appended table.4. The applicants complained under Article 3 about their life sentence with no prospect of release. Some applicants also raised other complaints under other the provisions of the Convention.THE LAWJOINDER OF THE APPLICATIONS5. Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single judgment.ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 3 of the Convention6. The applicants complained principally of their life sentence with no prospect of release. They relied, expressly or in substance, on Article 3 of the Convention, which reads as follows:Article 3“No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”7. The Court reiterates that the Convention does not prohibit the imposition of a life sentence on those convicted of especially serious crimes, such as murder. Yet to be compatible with Article 3 such a sentence must be reducible de jure and de facto, meaning that there must be both a prospect of release for the prisoner and a possibility of review. The basis of such review must extend to assessing whether there are legitimate penological grounds for the continuing incarceration of the prisoner. These grounds include punishment, deterrence, public protection and rehabilitation. The balance between them is not necessarily static and may shift in the course of a sentence, so that the primary justification for detention at the outset may not be so after a lengthy period of service of sentence. The importance of the ground of rehabilitation is underlined, since it is here that the emphasis of European penal policy now lies, as reflected in the practice of the Contracting States, in the relevant standards adopted by the Council of Europe, and in the relevant international materials (see Vinter and Others v. the United Kingdom [GC], nos. 66069/09 and 2 others, §§ 59-81, ECHR 2013 (extracts)).8. In the leading case of Petukhov v. Ukraine (no. 2) (no. 41216/13, 12 March 2019), the Court already found a violation in respect of issues similar to those in the present case.9. Having examined all the material submitted to it, the Court has not found any fact or argument capable of persuading it to reach a different conclusion on the admissibility and merits of these complaints. Some applicants also raised other complaints under various Articles of the Convention.11. The Court has examined the applications and considers that, in the light of all the material in its possession and in so far as the matters complained of are within its competence, these complaints either do not meet the admissibility criteria set out in Articles 34 and 35 of the Convention or do not disclose any appearance of a violation of the rights and freedoms enshrined in the Convention or the Protocols thereto.It follows that this part of the applications must be rejected in accordance with Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION12.

Article of the Convention at issue: Article 3
Outcome: violation