Prosecutor opens criminal case against sex abuse care home
The prosecutor's office is to open criminal proceedings against a care home which was at the center of a sexual abuse case last year.
The decision followed guidance published by the Supreme Court on Wednesday which stated that while current law bars courts from ordering prosecutors to act in opening a proceeding against Pihlakodu, which operated the care home, the Prosecutor's Office itself erred in not opening a criminal case against the company. This had followed a criminal complaint against the operators of the Pihlakodu home.
"We have reviewed the Supreme Court's ruling and, based on the positions and guidance set out in it, we will initiate criminal proceedings against Pihlakodu as a legal entity. The purpose of the proceedings is to determine the company's possible liability in cases involving the mistreatment of Pihlakodu clients," said Prosecutor General Astrid Asi.
Based on an earlier analysis of the evidence gathered in the main case, the prosecutor's office had concluded that there were insufficient grounds to bring criminal allegations against the legal entity.
"In its ruling, the Supreme Court emphasized that the threshold for opening criminal proceedings is lower than our earlier assessment assumed, and highlighted the need to assess the possible liability of the legal entity more thoroughly. In line with the Supreme Court's guidance, we are initiating criminal proceedings against Pihlakodu OÜ. We will review all the collected materials again and, if necessary, carry out additional measures," Asi went on.
Supreme Court: Prosecutors erred in not opening Pihlakodu case
On June 16 last year, 11 people filed a criminal complaint with the Office of the Prosecutor General, seeking to start criminal proceedings against the care home operator.
The complaint stated that a care assistant at the facility had raped several residents at the nursing home, owned by Pihlakodu, and located in Tabasalu, just outside Tallinn.
Among the plaintiffs were the offspring of some of the victims of former caregiver Mark Davõdov, found guilty last November.
While Davõdov was sentenced to 11 years in prison, the complainants argued that the company may have facilitated the crime.
However, the Office of the Prosecutor General declined to open a criminal case on the grounds that there was no information indicating that Pihlakodu's management had been aware of the rape suspicions, while the employee's actions could not be attributed to the company.
The complainants then challenged that refusal to initiate proceedings. The chief state prosecutor, the second-tier circuit court and the Supreme Court's criminal chamber all concluded that the law did not grant them standing to appeal in the present circumstances, meaning the court could not order the prosecutor to launch criminal proceedings.
The Supreme Court noted that only a victim themselves may challenge a refusal to initiate a criminal case. Under the law, a victim is someone who has suffered direct harm from a crime. Thus, in the context of the offenses, only the mothers of the complainants could have been considered victims in this understanding.
At the same time, the Supreme Court found that the prosecution had made significant errors in declining to open the criminal case against Davõdov. The court recalled that the threshold for initiating criminal proceedings is low. Such a decision must be based primarily on the criminal complaint, generally assuming that the facts described there are true, the top court said. Determining whether there is evidence of an alleged crime is already a task within criminal proceedings. Suspicions of possible sexual abuse of elderly nursing home residents must be investigated especially thoroughly, as the elderly themselves may not be in a position adequately to defend their rights.
In the current case, the plaintiffs had submitted a "substantial" amount of information to the prosecution which could have been examined during the course of proceedings, the Supreme Court said. Among other aspects, the complaints indicated that suspicions of possible sexual abuse had repeatedly reached the nursing home's management before the employee was ultimately detained.
The Supreme Court noted that no final conclusions on Pihlakodu's liability can be drawn on the basis of the complaint alone, but added there was sufficient information contained in the complaint to initiate proceedings. The prosecution could not deny Pihlakodu's connection to the abuse of residents without first investigating the alleged violations, the court found.
The Supreme Court also called to mind the fact that when a refusal to initiate a criminal case gets challenged, a higher-ranking prosecutor must assess the legality of that decision, even if the complainant does not have the right to appeal.
The prosecutor's office said last June it had analyzed a second criminal report filed against Pihlakodu AS and had not identified any new circumstances that would provide grounds for initiating criminal proceedings against the nursing home within the scope of the Penal Code.
Victims' representatives: Prosecutor's original decision incorrect and unjustified
Following the Supreme Court decision, sworn advocates Olavi-Jüri Luik, Oliver Nääs and Elise Altroff, representing victims' relatives, said they were "very pleased that the Supreme Court took a position regarding the suspicion of a crime even in a situation where, formally, there was actually no right to appeal against the refusal to open criminal proceedings. This shows just how clearly incorrect and unjustified the prosecutor's decision was to refuse to initiate criminal proceedings against Pihlakodu."
The statement said a "substantial, clearly systematized body of evidence" had been submitted, including 21 written pieces, three cases indicating Pihlakodu knew of rape suspicions, and 13 proposed witnesses. A separate meeting to clarify the suspicion had been attended in person by the Prosecutor General, the statement said.
"In light of all the above, it is not reasonably understandable how the prosecutor's office could consider such a volume of information insufficient – there was many times more of it than an average victim could ever gather independently. Shifting the burden of proof onto the victim and refusing to open an investigation on the basis of inadequate reasoning constitutes an entirely new low point for the prosecutor's office and gives cause for serious self-reflection," the statement concluded.
Davõdov was in November 2025 sentenced by Harju County Court to 11 years in prison over sexual offenses in respect of eight victims, all elderly residents of the Pihlakodu facility. Davõdov claimed the acts were consensual; the court rejected this argument; five of the victims suffered from severe dementia at the time of the offenses and the remaining three were also deemed incapable of comprehending or resisting what was happening. Davõdov was aware of the victims' conditions and still acted intentionally, the county court found.
District court dismissed Davõdov appeal
The second tier Tallinn Circuit Court on Wednesday left the 2025 county court ruling unchanged and dismissed an appeal for a reduced sentence for v, in part because of his pleading guilty. The defendant's costs, set by the county court at €6,705, remain in place.
The circuit court decision has not entered into force and can be challenged via in cassation proceedings, meaning no new evidence is examined and the existing case is examined on its own merits, with the Supreme Court.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Urmet Kook
