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News server Romea.cz. Everything about Roma in one place

Czech Republic: Anti-Roma demo in Duchcov allegedly followed by Roma assault on extremists, police brutality

15 July 2013
5 minute read

News server Policejní deník (Police Daily) reports that on the evening of Saturday, 13 July, police officers received a call to their emergency line that two men had been assaulted in a pub in Duchcov (Teplice district). Patrols of both municipal and state police went to the scene.

"After arriving at the scene, they determined that four Romani men had assaulted two [non-Romani] men after a demonstration. According to the assailants’ statements, it was because [the non-Roma] had participated in the anti-Roma demonstration," Police Daily reports.

An unexpected detention

Three of the four assailants were detained at the scene by the police. Police Daily claims a fourth Romani assailant fled the scene, but his common-law wife says differently.

"The police did detain three men at the scene but they let my partner go, they didn’t arrest him. We were standing out in front of our building later that evening and some police officers walked by and greeted him as usual," Renáta Lázová told news server Romea.cz.

Police Daily reports that the officers contacted riot units based in Ústí nad Labem who were returning from their deployment to the demonstrations in České Budějovice (see http://www.romea.cz/en/news/czech/czech-police-detain-dozens-of-anti-roma-demonstrators-in-ceske-budejovice-for-a-third-saturday-in-a-row).  Those riot officers then detained the fourth alleged assailant in the building where he resides.

When police entered the building, the alleged assailant was visiting neighbors. "The man did his best to hide from the officers, but did not succeed," is how Police Daily reports that information. 

Lázová:  Police officers beat my partner up

The riot officers detained the man at 12:30 AM Sunday. "He did not resist, but the riot police knocked him to the ground and beat him up. Then they dragged him down the stairs, he was shouting in pain the whole time. They put him down on the floor of the car under their feet, they wouldn’t even let him sit up. According to some acquaintances who witnessed it, the riot police then took my partner to a place here called the Viaduct and beat him up again there. They said his cries and shouts could be heard from there for 15 to 20 minutes," Lázová said.

Daniel Vítek, the Ústí Regional Police press spokesperson, said that on the basis of the prior agreement of the state prosecutor, the man was detained after midnight on Sunday on suspicion of committing several crimes related to the assault on Saturday of two men in a pub in Duchcov. "While being taken into custody the suspect repeatedly disobeyed police officers’ instructions and presented active resistance, so they had to use force against him as prescribed by law," Vítek told news server Romea.cz.

Lázová, however, says the officers invented those claims. "When they came to take him in, my partner was standing in the doorway of my cousin’s apartment with her and her husband. They asked each of them their names, and when he said his, about 10 riot police threw themselves at him. He put his head to the wall and was struck in the belly with a truncheon. Then several police officers lay down on top of him. How could he have presented any resistance to that many officers in that situation?" Lázová said.

"After he was detained, my partner asked if he could put his shoes back on, but an officer kicked him and they took him just in his t-shirt and shorts. When they were searching our apartment, the police even busted into the room where our three children were asleep with machine guns in their hands. When I saw they were heading there I begged them not to scare the children and they told me to shut up," Lázová said.

What is the medical condition of the detained man now? Vítek says that during the arrest Lázová’s partner merely suffered "minor abrasions to his face, officers provided him first aid and offered him the option of seeing a doctor, which the detainee refused."  

Lázová, however, continues to fear for her partner’s health. She says police have repeatedly refused to tell her how his health is or whether he has received a doctor’s care.

"His father and I went there and all they would tell us is that his time in custody has been extended to 72 hours. When I asked about the state of his health, the officer said he is not obligated to give me that information," Lázová said. She is preparing to file criminal charges against the intervening police officers.

Claims have surfaced in online discussions of the incident that the four Romani assailants who allegedly beat up the two right-wing extremists last Saturday belong to the Romani family that brutally beat up a non-Romani married couple in Duchcov earlier this year. "Two of them are from that extended family, but my partner and his brother have nothing to do with them," Lázová has told news server Romea.cz.

Right-wing extremists went on violent spree

The brawl in the pub was preceded that afternoon by right-wing extremists going on a violent spree through the streets of the town. About 40 citizens, some of whom were right-wing extremists, had gathered for an anti-Roma assembly there. 

The demonstrators listened to a brief speech on the town square and then dispersed. Some of them set out for the southern part of town, where the Romani neighborhood is.

Police prevented them from marching any further at the intersection of Bílinská and Nádražní Streets around 16:00. In response to the anti-Roma assembly about 70 Romani residents gathered on Bílinská and Karel Čapek Streets.

"A small group of neo-Nazis and locals came here and cursed at me. Then a black car drove up with four people in it, two guys and two women. One of the guys pulled out a plastic bottle half-full of beer and threw it at me," Štefan Horvát of the Květina (Flower) civic association told news server Romea.cz.

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