Albania ‘Held Mentally Ill Man in Prison Illegally’

The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg said on Tuesday that it had found in favour of Arben Strazimiri, who was detained in a prison hospital because Albania does not have specialist healthcare institutions for people who have been ordered to undergo compulsory treatment for mental illness.

The court found that Strazimiri had suffered inhuman or degrading treatment because of substandard living conditions in the prison hospital and received inadequate psychiatric care, which mostly involved the use of psychotropic drugs, not psychotherapy.

It also found that Strazimiri had suffered "continued deprivation of liberty in a prison rather than a medical institution".

Strazimiri, 47, was first arrested in 2008 for premeditated attempted murder, but courts found he could not be held criminally accountable because of paranoid schizophrenia.

Since then, he has been held at the Prison Hospital in Tirana because the country doesn't have a specialist healthcare facility for those undergoing compulsory treatment.

"The court found in particular that there had been a longstanding failure by the Albanian authorities to set up a special medical institution for the mentally ill who were deprived of their liberty on the strength of court-ordered compulsory treatment," the court said.

"That was in breach of its domestic statutory obligations, and pointed to a structural problem," it added.

The court also said that the Prison Hospital is "in an advanced state of dilapidation" without central heating and only one psychiatrist for 84 patients.

"The court held that the authorities should as a matter of urgency ensure that the applicant receive individualised therapy and consider placing him in an alternative setting, outside a...