CAT/C/48/D/433/2010 provided no such explanation, and thus the Committee must conclude that the police officers inflicted the complainant’s injuries. The Committee also notes the uncontested failure to register the complainant’s detention, to provide him with a lawyer and with access to an independent medical examination.23 Based on the detailed account which the complainant has given of his torture and medical documentation corroborating his allegations, the Committee concludes that the facts, as reported, constitute torture within the meaning of article 1 of the Convention, and that the State party failed in its duty to prevent and punish acts of torture, in violation of article 2, paragraph 1, of the Convention. 12.3 The complainant also claims that no prompt, impartial and effective investigation has been carried out into his allegations of torture, that those responsible have not been prosecuted and that he and his family received threats and were subject to intimidation, in violation of articles 12 and 13 of the Convention. The Committee notes that, although the complainant reported the acts of torture several days after the events, a preliminary inquiry was initiated only after a month and resulted in a refusal to open a criminal investigation. Thereafter, following the complainant’s appeals, the investigation was repeatedly restarted and closed several times by different prosecutorial and investigative bodies, and resulted in closure of the investigation with no criminal responsibility being attributed to police officers due to lack of evidence. 12.4 The Committee recalls that an investigation in itself is not sufficient to demonstrate the State party’s conformity with its obligations under article 12 of the Convention if it can be shown not to have been conducted impartially. 24 In this respect, it notes that the investigation was entrusted to the police department (Southern Department of Internal Affairs) where the alleged torture had been committed and thereafter to the body hierarchically superior (the Department of Internal Security of the Regional Department of Internal Affairs). The Committee recalls its concern that preliminary examinations of complaints of torture and ill-treatment by police officers are undertaken by the Department of Internal Security, which is under the same chain of command as the regular police force, and consequently do not lead to impartial examinations.25 12.5 Article 12 also requires that the investigation should be prompt, impartial and effective, promptness being essential both to ensuring that the victim cannot continue to be subjected to such acts and because, in general, unless the methods employed have permanent or serious effects, the physical traces of torture, and especially of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, soon disappear.26 The Committee notes that a preliminary investigation was started a month after the reported facts of torture, while the medical examination of the complainant was not conducted until 23 April 2007, three weeks after his discharge from the hospital. The scientific examination of the clothes worn by the complainant and the officers accused of torture was carried out only on 16 July 2007, i.e., more than three months after the alleged torture, the result of the examination being compromised because the officers’ clothes had been washed. The Committee also notes that the investigation relied heavily on the testimony of the police officers who denied any involvement in the torture and attached little weight to the complainant’s consistent statements and the uncontested medical evidence documenting the injuries inflicted on him. Furthermore, although in the course of the renewed investigation of December 2010, the complainant reconfirmed his allegations during numerous interrogations, and despite the 23 24 25 26 16 The Committee expressed concern about insufficient safeguards to prevent torture in detention in its concluding observations on the State party’s second periodic report (CAT/C/KAZ/CO/2, para. 9). See communication No. 257/2004, Keremedchiev v. Bulgaria, decision adopted on 11 November 2008, para. 9.4. See Committee’s concluding observations on Kazakhstan, CAT/C/KAZ/CO/2, para. 24. Communication No. 59/1996, Blanco Abad v. Spain, Views adopted on 14 May 1998, para. 8.2.