Cestaro v. Italy (Application no. 6884/11)

A selection of key paragraphs can be found below the judgement.

177. In the present case, the Court cannot overlook the fact that according to the Court of Cassation the violence at the Diaz-Pertini School of which the applicant was a victim had been perpetrated ‘for punitive purposes, for retribution, geared to causing humiliation and physical and mental suffering on the part of the victims’, and that it could qualify as ‘torture’ under the terms of the Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (see paragraph 77 above). […].
178. Furthermore, it transpires from the case file that the police officers kicked the applicant and struck him with tonfa-type truncheons, which the appeal judgment described as potentially lethal (see paragraph 68 above), and that the applicant had been repeatedly hit on different parts of his body.
The blows received by the applicant caused multiple fractures (to the right ulna, the right styloid, the right fibula and several ribs), leading to a four-day stay in hospital, over forty days’ unfitness for work, a surgical operation during his stay in hospital and a further operation a few years later, all of which left the applicant with a permanent weakness in his left arm and leg (see paragraphs 34-35 and 155 above). The ill-treatment inflicted on the applicant has therefore had severe physical consequences. […]
190. In conclusion, having regard to all the facts set out above, the Court considers that the ill-treatment suffered by the applicant during the police storming of the Diaz-Pertini School must be classified as ‘torture’ within the meaning of Article 3 of the Convention.