Stanev v. Bulgaria, No. 36760/06, ECtHR (Grand Chamber), 17 January 2012

Inhuman and degrading treatment of a person suffering from allegedly schizophrenia placed for seven years in a social care home with poor hygienic conditions and insufficient food. Violation article 3.

Art. 3 ECHR

1. Article 3 enshrines one of the most fundamental values of democratic societies. The provision prohibits in absolute terms torture or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, irrespective of the conduct of the person concerned. In order to fall under the scope of article 3, a treatment must attain a minimum threshold of severity. This minimum severity is relative; it depends on all the circumstances of the case, such as the duration of the treatment, its physical or mental effects and, in some cases, the sex, age and state of health of the victim.

2. Treatment has been held by the Court to be ‘inhuman’ because, inter alia, it was premeditated, was applied for hours at a stretch and caused either actual bodily injury or intense physical or mental suffering. Treatment has been considered ‘degrading’ when it was such as to arouse in its victims feelings of fear, anguish and inferiority capable of humiliating and debasing them and possibly breaking their physical or moral resistance or driving them to act against their will or conscience. In this connection, the question whether such treatment was intended to humiliate or debase the victim is a factor to be taken into account, although the absence of any such purpose does not inevitably lead to a finding that there has been no violation of article 3.

3. The prohibition of ill-treatment in article 3 applies equally to all forms of deprivation of liberty, and in particular makes no distinction according to the purpose of the measure in issue; it is immaterial whether the measure entails detention ordered in the context of criminal proceedings or admission to an institution with the aim of protecting the life or health of the person concerned.
(The applicant complained about the violation of his right to be free from inhuman and degrading treatment under article 3 following a seven-year stay at a social care home for people with mental disorders, where hygienic conditions were poor and food was insufficient. A domestic court declared him partially lacking legal capacity on the ground he was suffering from schizophrenia, placing him under partial guardianship without his prior consent. An independent psychiatrist deemed the diagnosis of schizophrenia inaccurate. It was, in fact, alcohol abuse, making the stay in the social care home very damaging for the applicant’s health and rendering him capable of reintegrating into society. The government had not acted to close the institution, despite during two official visits the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment had concluded that the conditions at the home amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment. The Court found that there had been a violation of article 3).

The applicant complained also about the violation of other rights protected by the Convention. The Court held that there had been a violation of the right to access to court under article 6 because the applicant could not have access to court to seek restoration of his legal capacity. In the context of deprivation of liberty, the state had been also in breach of article 5, paragraph 1 in that the procedure for the placement in a social care home for persons with mental disorders had not complied with the law. The lack of remedies for the applicant (i) to challenge the lawfulness of placement in a social care home and (ii) to obtain compensation for poor living conditions in the home amounted to violations of article 5, paragraph 4 and article 13 respectively.