CAT/C/52/D/402/2009 infirmary on the evening of 12 October 2005, where he was awaited by five people calling themselves members of DRS. Questioned about the news leak, the complainant was again violently tortured, being subjected in particular to electric shock sessions, and then spent seven months in solitary confinement, forbidden to speak to anyone, in a 3 square metre cell with no window and lit by a bright fluorescent light day and night; and underfed. Despite many letters of protest to the prison warden and the Minister of Justice, it was not until May 2006 that he was moved to another cell, still in the solitary confinement wing but where there were other prisoners. 2.14 On 23 October 2005, the complainant was taken from his cell by three DRS officials and thrown into a car. His hands were tied behind his back and his face was covered once they were out of the prison gate. The complainant was driven to a secret detention centre, where he was stripped and placed naked in a cell, beaten with a heavy electrical cord, and slapped and insulted. The officers who subjected him to this treatment wanted him to inform them of the activities of the Islamic prisoners. When he refused, they hung him for hours from a ladder affixed to the wall. The complainant spent one day in this secret detention centre. He heard the cries of many people, who were probably, like him, victims of torture. 2.15 After 10 months of investigation, the complainant’s trial was set for 10 May 2006, then adjourned to 24 May 2006, then to 7 and 21 June 2006. At each new hearing, there was a new judge, for unknown reasons. The complainant systematically reported the acts of torture to each trial judge, and each one replied either that torture did not exist in Algeria, or that the matter of torture could not be considered and must be taken up in another proceeding. The complainant was sentenced to 1 year in prison. 2.16 After his release from prison on 4 July 2006, the complainant was under constant surveillance by DRS, and received anonymous telephone calls telling him to “keep quiet” if he did not wish to spend his life in prison. In October 2006, the complainant published an interview on the Internet with a Tunisian journal describing the acts of torture inflicted on him, and implicating the Minister for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. After more threatening phone calls, he decided to leave Algeria. He managed to reach Tunisia using false papers, and then went to France, where, on 26 December 2006, he submitted an application for refugee status, which was granted to him on 31 March 2008. His family, which had remained in Algeria and had often received threatening phone calls during his detention in 2005, is still under surveillance. The acts of torture inflicted on the complainant have severely impaired his health, including an almost totally, and irreversibly, disabled left leg, a damaged spinal column, and pains in his kidneys and sides, from the beatings he received. In addition to the overall deterioration in his physical condition, the complainant suffers from violent headaches, nightmares, and recurrent insomnia. The complaint 3.1 The complainant states that he is a victim of treatment that constitutes acts of torture within the meaning of article 1 of the Convention, having been subjected to severe pain and suffering (see the acts of torture described in the facts section), as attested by medical certificates drawn up in France, dated 6 March 2007 and 28 August 2008.3 His suffering is such that in France he was granted disabled worker status with a 50 per cent work disablement.4 Moreover, during the 15 days in which he was secretly detained in April 3 4 6 The medical certificates are annexed to the complaint. A medical certificate dated 26 May 2008 was prepared at the request of the complainant, in support of his application to be recognized as a disabled worker in France; see annex 25 of the initial communication. GE.14-05037