Published on 24 March 2025
 
FIFTH SECTION
Application no. 28329/16
Volodymyr Mykolayovych TERESHCHENKO
against Ukraine
lodged on 11 May 2016
communicated on 3 March 2025
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the applicant’s complaints under Article 6 §§ 1 and 2 of the Convention regarding the alleged breach of the presumption of innocence in connection with the accusatory wording against the applicant used by a prosecutor in a bill of indictment. On 29 September 2015 the Kyiv Regional Prosecutor’s Office referred the bill of indictment to a trial court in criminal proceedings against the applicant concluding that he “had committed the crime in the form of offering, promising and providing illegal profit to a public official”. On 15 January 2016 the Irpin Local Court of Kyiv Region, acting as the trial court, remitted the case to the Prosecutor’s Office for correction of shortcomings and noted, inter alia, that in the bill of indictment the applicant had been referred to as a person who had committed the above crime in the absence of his guilt having been established by the court. On 23 March 2016 the Kyiv Regional Court of Appeal quashed the trial court’s decision and remitted the criminal case against the applicant to the trial court for consideration on the merits. The Court of Appeal did not address the applicant’s arguments that the prosecutor’s declaration of the applicant’s guilt in the bill of indictment had breached his presumption of innocence. The proceedings against the applicant are currently pending at the trial court.
 
 
QUESTION TO THE PARTIES
Was the presumption of innocence, guaranteed by Article 6 § 2 of the Convention, respected in the present case (see, for example, Bavčar v. Slovenia, no. 17053/20, §§ 104-08, 7 September 2023, with further references therein)?