Constitutional Court

KI205/18 Applicant: Elmi Dragusha, Constitutional review of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Kosovo, Pml. No. 197/18, of 1 October 2018 and Pml. No. 261/2018, of 16 October 2018 

KI205/18 Resolution on Inadmissibility, of 5 September 2019, published on 26 September 2019

Keywords: Individual referral, criminal proceedings, reopening of criminal proceedings, right to a fair trial, manifestly ill-founded referral, inadmissible referral.

The Applicant alleged that the regular courts violated his rights guaranteed by Article 31 of the Constitution, as a result of a violation of the substantive law, the filing of an indictment and conviction without sufficient facts and evidence, and the prejudice of the case by the judge of the first instance court.

Initially, the Court noted that the Applicant’s Referral had to do with two types of the court proceedings, the regular one (trial on guilt), in which the Applicant was found guilty of committing the criminal offense in violation of Article 320 of the CCRK and the request for reopening of criminal proceedings filed against Judgments which found him guilty and sentenced him.

With regard to the regular criminal proceedings, the Court considered that the Applicant’s allegations of violation of his right to a fair and impartial trial are manifestly ill-founded, as the Court cannot in any way find that the Decision of the Supreme Court, which dismissed his request for procedural reasons, violates in any way his right to fair and impartial trial, guaranteed by Article 31 of the Constitution.

Whereas regarding the reopening of the criminal proceedings, the Court referring to its case law and the case law of the ECtHR, reiterated its position that in all cases where the request for reopening of criminal proceedings is rejected as ungrounded, or dismissed for procedural reasons by all regular court instances, Article 31 of the Constitution in the light of the interpretation of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, is not applicable.

In sum, the Court concludes that the Applicant’s Referral regarding the constitutional review of the regular proceedings is to be declared inadmissible, as manifestly ill-founded, in accordance with Rule 39 (2) of the Rules of Procedure, and the Referral for the constitutional review of a request for reopening of criminal proceedings is also to be declared inadmissible in accordance with Rule 39 (3) (b) of the Rules of Procedure.