CAT/C/56/D/577/2013 State party’s observations on admissibility and the merits 4.1 In a note verbale dated 4 April 2014, the State party submits that the communication is inadmissible because the complainant failed to exhaust the available domestic remedies. The State party maintains that all the complaints filed by the complainant before the authorities have been reviewed objectively, including by the courts. 4.2 The State party submits that the complainant was accused of committing crimes under articles 111.4 and 132.1 of the Criminal Code; a criminal case was initiated against him in accordance with the requirements of the law. The pretrial investigation established that on 1 November 2007, the complainant, while intoxicated, had a fight with K. and inflicted multiple injuries on him, which eventually led to K.’s death. After injuring and incapacitating K., the complainant also raped him. The complainant was convicted by Pyatigorsk City Court for those crimes. 4.3 The complainant’s allegation that he was beaten by police officers on 12 and 13 October 2008 in order to extract a confession from him was refuted by the results of the pre-investigation verification that was conducted following his complaint. According to the conclusions of the forensic medical examinations conducted on 28 November 2008 and 31 May 2013 as part of that verification and the testimony of the expert conducting the examinations, the complainant’s hearing loss was the result of an ear infection (cochleitis). Both examinations revealed a healed fracture of the eighth rib, which had resulted from a blow with a blunt instrument or from a fall. In the course of the pre-investigation verification, the medical records from 19 October 2008 of Federal Detention Centre No. 26/2, where the complainant was transferred from the temporary detention centre, were collected and examined. According to the records, the complainant was examined upon arrival, assessed as “practically healthy” and diagnosed with chronic alcoholism. On 23 October 2008, the complainant requested a medical examination, claiming that he had physical injuries. He was subjected to an examination by a commission consisting of four medical doctors the same day; the commission did not find evidence of any injuries. 4.4 The State party submits that the procedural documents contained no complaints from the complainant or his lawyer regarding allegations of violence. Prior to his conviction, the complainant made no other complaints to the investigator, the defender, the head of the investigative body, the prosecutor or the court. 4.5 In the light of the finding from the pre-investigation verification that police officers were not implicated in violence against the complainant, and the fact that the complainant had suffered a rib fracture, a criminal investigation into the allegation of intentionally inflicted moderate bodily harm was initiated by the Investigation Department of the Internal Affairs Department in Pyatigorsk. 4.6 The issues related to the exertion by police officers of moral and physical pressure on the complainant were also investigated in the course of judicial proceedings. The Court addressed the claims in its verdict, considering them to amount to a defence strategy. 4.7 Regarding the complainant’s claim that the 22 October 2010 and the 25 February 2011 court decisions have not been implemented, the State party submits that that is not an accurate reflection of reality. Following the 22 October 2010 decision, on 17 February 2011, the deputy head of Pyatigorsk Interregional Investigation Department revoked the 23 July 2010 decision of the senior investigator of the Department not to initiate a criminal case, and returned the case for additional verification. An investigator of the Investigation Department of the Investigative Directorate of the Office of the Prosecutor of the Russian Federation was questioned, and testified that he and his colleagues had not exercised any moral or physical pressure on the complainant. The complainant’s claim that he had been subjected to electric shocks was not confirmed by the forensic medical examination, which revealed no traces of such treatment on his body. Following the verification of the 4