At no time did Hermans, a former animal rights activist, approach the crucial security perimeter behind which nuclear material is kept. But the court found her actions, which included pulling faces at a security camera to provoke guards to come and get her, “a malicious form of misbehaviour”, following the public prosecutor’s description of her as “stubborn and deviant”.

De Morgen commentator Yves De Smet wondered when childish misbehaviour became a crime and concluded that Hermans was being used to make an example. In the 1990s, Hermans was responsible, together with other members of the Animal Liberation Front, for several fires in fast-food restaurants in Flanders. She went to prison for those crimes in 2002. Since then, she has expressed regret for her actions and studied to be a child-care worker. She said she considers being called “deviant” a compliment. “It means I don’t fit into the sausage machine that society demands,” she said.