BOUYID v. BELGIUM JUDGMENT – SEPARATE OPINION 41 has been established that a particular instance of treatment has attained the requisite level of severity. There is also good ground for thinking that the absolute nature of the prohibition set forth in Article 3 is one of the reasons why the Court has found that this Article will be breached only where the level of severity has been attained. The Court regularly reiterates that it is attentive to the seriousness attaching to a ruling that a Contracting State has violated fundamental rights (see, among other authorities, Nachova and Others v. Bulgaria [GC], nos. 43577/98 and 43579/98, § 147, ECHR 2005-VII; Mathew v. the Netherlands, no. 24919/03, § 156, ECHR 2005-IX; and Georgia v. Russia (I) [GC], no. 13255/07, § 94, ECHR 2014). This is especially true of a finding of a violation of Article 3, a provision that enshrines “one of the most fundamental values of democratic societies” (see paragraph 81 of the present judgment) and requires an absolute prohibition by States. Accordingly, we should avoid trivialising findings of a violation of Article 3. The situation complained of in the present case is far less serious than the treatment inflicted by law-enforcement officers in many other cases that the Court has unfortunately had to deal with. What impact, then, does a finding of a violation of Article 3 still have?2 8. The victim’s vulnerability is a factor that may be taken into account in assessing the seriousness of an interference with human dignity. The majority refer in this connection, admittedly as a secondary consideration, to the fact that the first applicant was a minor at the material time (see paragraphs 109-10 of the judgment). We consider that the Court does not have enough information to treat the first applicant’s age as a truly relevant factor in the present case. This was not his first confrontation with the police. Moreover, he was a member of a family who had had difficult relations with the police for years and who had lodged several criminal complaints against police officers. Referring simply to the first applicant’s age as a basis for concluding that he was a vulnerable person towards whom the police officers should have shown “greater vigilance and self-control” (see paragraph 110 of the present judgment) is in our view an overly theoretical approach. The conclusion reached on this point risks being completely at odds with reality. 9. In finding that there has been a violation of the substantive aspect of Article 3, the majority have sought to display zero tolerance towards police officers who resort to physical force that has not been made strictly 2. A question that has not been discussed in the present case but will no doubt arise in the future is whether the strict standard set by the majority should now also be applied in cases concerning the extradition or expulsion of aliens. Would Article 3 stand in the way of the extradition or deportation of an alien to a country where he or she is at risk of being slapped (once)?