atings. Having carefully assessed the applicant's account of events, the statements from various witnesses and the conclusions of the medical examination, the trial court dismissed the applicant's complaint as unfounded.
58. Having regard to the pace of the investigation and the measures taken by the authorities to verify the applicant's submissions, the Court finds that the investigation carried out by them was prompt and thorough and satisfied the criteria established in its case-law on the matter. Consequently, it concludes that the applicant's complaint under the procedural limb of Article 3 of the Convention is manifestly ill-founded and should be rejected under Article 35 §§ 3 and 4 of the Convention.
(b) The alleged ill-treatment
59. The Court reiterates that allegations of ill-treatment must be supported by appropriate evidence. To assess this evidence, the Court has generally applied the standard of proof "beyond reasonable doubt", but added that such proof may follow from the coexistence of sufficiently strong, clear and concordant inferences or of similar presumptions of fact (see Ireland v. the United Kingdom, 18 January 1978, § 161, Series A No. 25, and Labita v. Italy [GC], No. 26772/95, § 121, ECHR 2000-IV). Where an individual is taken into police custody or arrives otherwise under the control of the authorities in good health and is found to be injured while in detention or under their control, it is incumbent on the State to provide a plausible explanation of how those injuries were caused, failing which a clear issue arises under Article 3 of the Convention (see Tomasi v. France, 27 August 1992, §§, Series A No. 241-A; Selmouni, cited above, § 87; and Bursuc v. Romania, No. 42066/98, § 80, 12 October 2004). The Court is sensitive to the subsidiary nature of its tasks and recognises that it must be cautious in taking on the role of a first-instance tribunal of fact, where this is not rendered unavoidable by the circumstances of a particular case (see McKerr v. the United Kingdom (dec.), No. 28883/95, 4 April 2000). Nonetheless, where allegations are made under Article 3 of the Convention, as in the present case, the Court must apply a particularly thorough scrutiny (see, mutatis mutandis, Ribitsch v. Austria, 4 December 1995, § 32, Series A No. 336, and {Aktas} v. Turkey, No. 24351/94, § 271, ECHR 2003-V (extracts)), even if certain domestic proceedings have taken place (see Cobzaru v. Romania, No. 48254/99, § 65, 26 July 2007).
60. In the instant case the ill-treatment complained of by the applicant consisted of threats and severe beatings which, according to him, had lasted for hours. In particular, he alleged that police officers had for hours hit and kicked him in the solar plexus, on the head, in the kidney area and the groin, and had threatened him with reprisals in respect of his mother and girlfriend. However, there are some elements which cast doubt on the veracity of the applicant's claims.
61. The Court observes that the domestic authorities' decisions dismissing the applicant's complaint were based, to an important extent, on the conclusions of the medical examination of the applicant's injuries carried out by a forensic expert. He found that the bruises to the applicant's ear and chest had been sustained two to three days prior to his arrest (see, by contrast, Tomasi, cited above, § 110). It is noted that the conclusions of the expert, who had specific knowledge in forensic medicine, were made on the basis of the examination of the applicant, regard being had to his allegations and the relevant medical records. The applicant did not allege that the expert was not qualified, impartial or was otherwise incapable of performing the examination, and the Court finds no evidence to that effect. In the same vein, the Court considers that the applicant's reference to the encyclopaedic dictionary cannot call
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