Alleged assailant of 14-year-old Romani boy tells his side of the story

As we reported earlier this week, 14-year-old Ladislav N., a Romani boy from Ostrava-Přívoz, is still hospitalized with bleeding of the brain. His mother, Jana Fišerová, says his injuries are the result of his having been assaulted and beaten, as do two eyewitnesses. Police officers have begun investigating the entire matter as a misdemeanor incident only. As promised, Romea.cz is now reporting on what the alleged assailant has to say about the incident.

The victim’s mother’s perspective

According to his mother, Jana Fišerová, Ladislav went out on Sunday 21 October and was standing together with friends his same age in front of the building at Macharova street no. 9. Ladislav was holding a bicycle which his friend Dušan had received as a birthday present and which was about to become the object of a dispute. A car pulled up in front of the building and three adult men and a young woman reportedly got out of it. The youngest man started shouting at Ladislav that the bicycle was his. Dušan responded that he had received it as a gift.

"The men assaulted them, threatened them, spit on them, and then started beating and kicking them. Ladislav has never been struck by anyone in his life, so he was afraid and started running away. He got to the building and wanted to hide out in the hallway, but one of the men caught up with him. He grabbed Ladislav by his hood, strangled him, and started to beat his head against the tiled wainscoting of the wall. Ladislav lost consciousness, but before he did, the young woman who had been with the attackers ran up and kicked him in the genitals. It was she who got scared when he stopped moving, and she called an ambulance, but she told the ambulance Ladislav had injured himself falling from a bicycle," Fišerová told news server Romea.cz. Her information came from two eyewitnesses at the scene.

"I was standing there holding the bicycle when this young guy I didn’t know came up and asked me whose it was. I said it was my friend’s and I was borrowing it. He immediately started chasing me. I wanted to hide in the hallway of the building where another friend of mine lives, but the doors were locked. He caught up to me and started beating me. My head hit the wall and I don’t remember anything else, I ended up unconscious on the ground," Ladislav described the incident to news serveru iDNES.cz.

"That’s exactly what happened. While this 18-year-old guy from the neighborhood, whom I had seen around before, beat up my friend, his father and sister calmly took the bicycle and put it into their car. When they saw that Ladislav was lying unconscious on the ground and that his head was bleeding, the girl became alarmed and called the police. In the meantime, my younger brother arrived on the scene and also called the police," says Diana, an eyewitness to the incident.

Testimony of the alleged perpetrator

Thanks to our collaboration with news server iDNES.cz, news server Romea.cz has managed to hear the perspective and testimony of the alleged perpetrator. The 18-year-old youth whom witnesses say was the main assailant described what happened to news server Romea.cz as follows:

"I disagree with the witnesses’ descriptions. I didn’t kick anyone, I didn’t bang anyone’s head against a wall and I didn’t strangle anyone. As I was leaving the store, I saw a Romani guy with my bicycle. I went after him. He was standing there with another Romani guy and a girl. One of the Romani guys started running away, and I wanted to catch him because I believed he was running away because he knew something more about the theft of the bicycle. I inadvertently pushed him and he fell against the corner of the building."

The youth says his father then arrived at the scene in his car a moment later. "I put the bicycle in the trunk and in the meantime, many people had gathered around us, including a lot of Romani people. The injured guy also ran up to us, and it didn’t look like anything very serious had happened to him," the young man said.

Father: They beat us up

The alleged assailant’s father told news server Romea.cz that he doesn’t want the case hushed up:  "I do not want to and never have wanted to lynch anybody. I have never had any problem with Romani people in my entire life. At the same time, I must tell you that the bicycle really was stolen from our cellar."

The father says he mainly wants passions over the incident to calm now. "For the time being this is just his word against ours, and people on either side may have given out imprecise information because they were emotional. We are waiting for a medical evaluation and other information of that sort. Should the police re-classify my son’s behavior from a misdemeanor to a felony, I would not be against it should that description be proven correct, but it would have to be supported by facts, not emotions," the father told Romea.cz.

The father said he drove his car to the scene after things started. "As far as my daughter kicking someone in the genitals goes, that didn’t happen until I myself was attacked. There were about 30 people around us and we were really being crowded by some of them. We didn’t drive the car at anyone, on the contrary, it’s completely banged up from their attack on us. However, I don’t want to make a big deal of this. I want emotions on both sides to calm down. The Workers’ Party or some group like that might get involved and I really would not like that, I am not a racist," the father said. He has requested police protection for his family because threats of violence against them have been posted online.

Eyewitness claims something else

According to the eyewitness named Diana, however, local children and youth did their best to defend Ladislav and wanted to prevent the family of the alleged assailant from driving away. "We wanted them to wait for the police, but they drove their car at us – they almost ran over one girl’s foot, so everyone ran away and they drove off," said Diana.

"I completely disagree with what the father and son are saying. Ladislav is not lying in intensive care for almost 14 days because he fell a single time against the corner of a building, as the attacker said. My son has three lacerations: One on his forehead, one on his upper lip, and one on the back of his neck – that was the one that started the bleeding of the brain. He is still experiencing strong headaches and taking very strong analgesics because of them," Jana Fišerová, Ladislav’s mother, told news server Romea.cz.

"I haven’t let my other son go to school ever since the incident, I arranged with them for him to be able to stay home. I’m afraid for him because that attacker lives somewhere around here," Fišerová said.

She wants her day in court with respect to Ladislav’s assault, but she also is does not want to see emotions rise or for there to be violent score-settling. "I don’t want revenge, I don’t want to argue with them or threaten them," she said of the other family.

Ladislav underwent a third operation today. He was originally scheduled for the operation yesterday, but the hospital postponed it.

"The operation lasts two and a half hours. It went well. I’m glad, I’m completely relieved," Ladislav’s mother told news server Romea.cz.

Police will probably reclassify the case

Police spokesperson Petr Svoboda said two misdemeanor offenses are being investigated in connection with the case: The theft, and a "misdemeanor against civil coexistence". He was reportedly unable to provide any more information, explaining that the case investigator was not on duty. When asked by iDNES.cz why the assault on the boy is being investigated as a mere misdemeanor when his medical treatment has lasted longer than seven days and the incident should therefore be considered a felony, Svoboda gave the following information:

"The case is still in the initial phase of investigation, we have not yet received any medical reports. If the treatment period lasts longer than seven days, the investigator will probably reclassify the incident to felony bodily harm."

Photographs are original

Lies have been spread online by those who would like to blame this entire incident on the Romani people involved to the effect that the photographs of Ladislav’s injuries featured in our first article on this issue (at the end of the article) were Photoshopped. They were not. We cropped the photographs so the victim’s entire face will not be visible because, according to the criminal code, it is forbidden to publish photographs of crime victims who are minors. The cropping enlarges the injuries so the details of the photographs are clear.