Legal summary
July 2025
Ludes and Others v. France - 40899/22, 41621/22 and 42956/22
Judgment 3.7.2025 [Section V]
Article 10
Criminal conviction of environmental activists for theft committed as joint enterprise, after they took down and did not return French President’s portrait in several town halls in protest against inadequacy of State measures to address climate change: no violation
Facts – The applicants, environmental activists, took part in a nationwide campaign started in February 2019 by the citizen movement Action non-violente COP21 (ANV-COP21). It involved taking down the French President’s official portrait in town halls across the country to draw attention to the State’s alleged inaction in the face of climate change. These “temporary requisitions” were intended to last until the State took action.
The applicants were all convicted of theft committed as a joint enterprise. Their appeals were unsuccessful.
Law – Article 10:
The applicants’ convictions for theft committed as a joint enterprise had amounted to an interference with the exercise of their right to freedom of expression, as provided for by law and pursuing the legitimate aim of “the prevention of disorder or crime”.
Even though their actions had involved committing a criminal offence, the applicants’ freedom of expression had to be granted an adequate level of protection – with a correspondingly narrow margin of appreciation afforded to the national authorities – having regard both to the subject matter of the message, which was one of public interest, and to the non‑violent nature of the actions by which it had been conveyed.
The domestic courts had performed their review by means of an analysis encompassing all the elements bearing on the context in which the actions in dispute had taken place, along with the applicants’ motives.
With regard to the consideration given to the “symbolic value of the portrait” of the President, that symbol had been at the very heart of the applicants’ activism. They had specifically targeted it, without making any personal attack on the President himself, in order to denounce and protest against what they saw as the State’s inaction in the fight against climate change. The leaflet the applicants had left in place of the portrait had explained that “the empty space left on the wall symbolises the government’s inaction on social and climate issues”. The Court considered that the domestic courts had been able to validly take into account the symbolic impact of the actions in question, both to establish the existence of a connection between those actions and the applicants’ exercise of their freedom of expression on a matter of public interest, and to assess the actual impact of the actions, beyond the low material value of the misappropriated property. Moreover, in a decision delivered after the judgments in the present cases, such consideration of the “symbolic value of the portrait”, among the various criteria established in its case-law, had led the Court of Cassation to adopt a different solution and to uphold an acquittal.
As regards the failure to return the portraits, the applicants had expressly characterised their actions as a temporary requisition which they would bring to an end only once their demands had been met. In the domestic courts’ view, the fact that the applicants had kept the portraits, after they had taken them down, had been such as to make the impact of their actions ambiguous and to call into question whether or not the damage could be reversed. The Court considered that the domestic courts had thus drawn a distinction between, on the one hand, the taking down of the portraits, which in itself had sufficed to clearly convey the applicants’ message and could not have been the subject of a criminal sanction in its own right without disregarding the requirements of Article 10 and, on the other hand, the subsequent appropriation of the portraits, which had constituted the offence of theft. In doing so, they had based their decisions to convict the applicants on reasons that appeared, in the specific circumstances of the present cases, both “relevant” and “sufficient”.
In addition, while it was true that the necessity of an interference with freedom of expression had in principle to be assessed in the light of all the consequences resulting from the criminal offence, the applicants’ activism had been based on the intentional commission of an ordinary offence. In consequence, the prosecution and investigative measures complained of had to be regarded, in the present cases, not as having had a chilling effect on the expression of their message but, on the contrary, as forming an integral part of their communication strategy.
Accordingly, having noted both the care taken by the domestic courts to assess proportionality from the standpoint of Article 10, and the subsequent developments in the Court of Cassation’s case-law, the Court saw no compelling reason, in the circumstances of the cases, to find fault with their assessment, which appeared neither arbitrary nor manifestly unreasonable.
As regards the nature and severity of the sanctions imposed, the applicants had not been sentenced to imprisonment but to suspended fines of between EUR 200 and EUR 500. The Court considered that the domestic courts had chosen particularly lenient sanctions, taking into account the nature and context of the conduct in question. Those sanctions had not therefore been disproportionate to the legitimate aim pursued.
In view of all the above considerations, the Court concluded that the national authorities had not overstepped the margin of appreciation afforded to the respondent State.
Conclusion: no violation (five votes to two).
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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