66 GÄFGEN v. GERMANY JUDGMENT – SEPARATE OPINIONS PARTLY DISSENTING OPINION OF JUDGE CASADEVALL JOINED BY JUDGES KOVLER1, MIJOVIĆ, JAEGER, JOČIENĖ AND LÓPEZ GUERRA (Translation) 1. I am unable to agree with the conclusions reached by the majority in this case regarding the applicant’s victim status and the finding of a violation of Article 3 of the Convention. The case was admittedly delicate in terms of the applicant’s legitimate rights, but was all the more delicate and difficult for the prosecuting authorities, who were faced with an extremely serious and tragic situation culminating in the murder of an 11-year-old child. 2. It is not disputed that the threats of violence against the applicant amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment proscribed by Article 3 of the Convention. This was formally acknowledged by the German judicial authorities: the Frankfurt am Main Regional Court stated that “the threat to cause the applicant pain in order to extract a statement from him had not only constituted a prohibited method of interrogation under Article 136a of the Code of Criminal Procedure; the threat had also disregarded Article 3 of the Convention”, and the Federal Constitutional Court found that “the applicant’s human dignity and the prohibition on subjecting prisoners to illtreatment ... had been disregarded” (see paragraph 120 of the judgment). 3. The Chamber held in its judgment that the applicant could no longer claim to be the victim of a violation of Article 3 after the domestic courts had acknowledged the violation and afforded sufficient redress for it, seeing that the two police officers involved in the events in question had been convicted and punished. I support that conclusion in the present case. 4. The majority of the Grand Chamber, endorsing the Chamber’s findings, consider that the domestic courts “acknowledged expressly and in an unequivocal manner that the applicant’s interrogation had violated Article 3 of the Convention” (see paragraph 120 in fine of the judgment); that the investigation and the criminal proceedings were “sufficiently prompt and expeditious to meet the standards set by the Convention” (see paragraphs 121 and 122); and that “the police officers were found guilty of coercion and incitement to coercion, respectively, under the provisions of German criminal law” (see paragraph 123). However, they conclude that the applicant can still claim to be a victim and that there has been a violation of Article 3. 5. This assessment appears to be based mainly on the leniency of the penalties imposed on the police officers, because 1 Rectified on 3 June 2010: the name of Judge Kovler has been added.