CAT/C/62/D/685/2015 United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment Distr.: General 9 January 2018 Original: English Committee against Torture Decision adopted by the Committee under article 22 of the Convention, concerning communication No. 685/2015*, ** Communication submitted by: H.I., L.I., S.I., A.I. (represented by counsel, Judith Pieters) Alleged victims: The complainants State party: The Netherlands Date of complaint: 23 February 2015 Date of present decision: 10 November 2017 Subject matter: Deportation from the Netherlands to Armenia Procedural issue: Incompatibility with the Convention Substantive issue: Risk of torture and ill-treatment Article of the Convention: 3 1.1 The complainants are H.I., born in 1970, his wife L.I., born in 1978, and their children S.I. and A.I., born in 1998 and 2000 respectively, all citizens of Armenia. Their applications for asylum have been rejected by the Netherlands. The complainants claim that their deportation to Armenia would constitute a violation of their rights under article 3 of the Convention. The complainants are represented by counsel. 1.2 On 5 June 2015, the Committee, acting through its Rapporteur on new complaints and interim measures, informed the complainants that it had denied their request for the provision of interim measures consisting of the issuance of a request to the State party to refrain from removing them to Armenia pending the examination of their complaint. The facts as presented by the complainants 2.1 H.I. started working in a garage owned by his cousin in the city of Abovyan in 2004. Sometimes he also delivered cars to customers, as an additional service of the garage. On 3 March 2007, he had to pick up a car for a person called D.M. D.M. had previously worked as a bodyguard for a former Armenian president. The complainants claim that it is widely known that D.M. beat a man to death in 2002, but that he was only found guilty of negligent manslaughter and sentenced to one year of probation for the crime. The complainants argue that this demonstrates that D.M. has connections who are able to influence the judiciary. While the male complainant was delivering the car, he was stopped * Adopted by the Committee at its sixty-second session (6 November–6 December 2017). ** The following members of the Committee participated in the examination of the communication: Essadia Belmir, Alessio Bruni, Felice Gaer, Claude Heller Rouassant, Jens Modvig, Ana Racu, Sébastien Touzé and Kening Zhang. GE.18-00323(E) 

Select target paragraph3