Roma who stood up to the neo-Nazis being prosecuted, racists from Janov apparently not

Tomorrow, two Roma will go to court on charges of rioting, defamation of a nation or race, and committing violence against a group or individuals. They are alleged to have committed the crimes on 4 October 2008 at the Janov housing estate in Litvínov when they stood up to a neo-Nazi provocation organized by the Workers’ Party (Dělnická strana – DS).

After the events of 4 October, the DS, National Resistance and Autonomous Nationalists organizations convened several more demonstrations in Litvínov which culminated on 17 November 2008 in an attempted pogrom on the Roma in Janov. Some non-Roma residents of the housing estate shouted harsh racist epithets at the Roma during the attempt, openly supporting the neo-Nazis’ attack on the local Roma. “Black fuckers!” shouted one young woman, while a man called the Roma “black swine”. The web server Romea.cz has recordings of this racist speech. According to the state prosecutor, these incidents did not constitute crimes.

On 4 October, 12 members of the “monitoring patrols” of the so-called “Protection Corps” of the DS met with resistance from local Roma. One Roma man who will be in court tomorrow yelled the following at Lucie Šlégrová, a DS member who regularly participates in neo-Nazi events: “What are you doing here? What are you doing here? Get out of here, you dirty Czech cunt! Why are you playing at being a fascist?” The DS provocateurs subsequently left the housing estate.

The neo-Nazis next organized a march on Janov on 18 October during which several hundred of them attacked the police with batons and paving stones; the police barely succeeded in protecting the housing estate. The neo-Nazi violence peaked on 17 November when several hundred neo-Nazis attacked police officers and fought the police for almost two hours with batons, paving stones and Molotov cocktails. Their aim was to get to the Janov housing estate in order to attack local Roma.

Local non-Roma residents openly supported the attack on the Roma and yelled racist insults at them such as “black fuckers” or “black swine”, which according to the state prosecutor is not a crime. “The police held repeated consultations with the supervising state prosecutor on the legal status of these acts, and the state prosecutor did not find them to constitute criminal behavior,” says the notification, which Romea.cz has at its disposal. Instead, this clearly racist behavior will be considered a mere misdemeanor. Police spokesperson Ludmila Světláková has confirmed to Romea.cz that “the case was sent to the relevant administrative body after consultation with the state prosecutor for misdemeanor proceedings,” but refused to give the name of the prosecutor concerned. “The police unfortunately cannot tell you the name of the state prosecutor. Only the aggrieved and the defendant have the right to review the files,” Světláková said.

“It is obvious that both examples involve the behavior of inciting racial hatred. However, if the authorities do not take a consistent approach to both cases, then the actions of the police and state prosecutor raise the justifiable concern that the perpetrators’ behavior is not being evaluated according to the same criteria,” Klára Kalibová, an external lawyer working for ROMEA, o.s., told Romea.cz.

The Most Police have initiated criminal prosecutions against 14 persons for neo-Nazi violence. “Another 12 people were investigated on suspicion of committing a crime or misdemeanor, and five of the cases were shelved because their behavior constituted neither a crime nor a misdemeanor. Seven people were sent to the misdemeanor proceedings run by the municipal authority. For 10 of those arrested, the decision of the district state attorney to initiate prosecution was quashed by a police decree and the cases were sent to the administrative organ for misdemeanor proceedings. Police in Most filed a proposal for lawsuits to be filed against the four charged with crimes. One case remains under investigation,” Světláková told Romea.cz.

Světláková says the four criminal cases involve both individual and multiple charges of rioting; violence against a group or individuals; defamation of a group based on nationality, ethnicity, race or conviction; incitement to hatred against a certain group; and incitement to restrict a group’s human rights and freedoms. Two of the four persons being criminally charged are the two Roma who stood up to the neo-Nazis. Police refuse to say whether the other two charged are neo-Nazis or not.

“Hundreds of violent attacks against civilians and the police were recorded on video at Janov. If the police are concerning themselves only with investigating the behavior of 26 people, it is obvious the investigation has not been conducted correctly,” Kalibová said. “It is completely unacceptable to end up with the situation where on the one hand, verbal violence is prosecuted, but on the other hand there is a total lack of official response to those who commit physical violence.”