Czech Police prosecuting 58-year-old from Ústí nad Labem for insulting posts about Romani people on social media
Police suspect a 58-year-old man from Ústí nad Labem, Czech Republic of committing defamation of an ethnic, national, racial or other group of persons and of committing the denial, doubting of, approving of and justifying of genocide. The man expressed himself on social media in quite an insulting way about the Romani national minority after the broadcasting of a Czech Television program.
The man’s posts sparked outrage and one social media discussant filed a crime report about them. “The Ústecký Regional Police have communicated through an accelerated procedure to a 58-year-old man that he is suspected of committing felony Defamation of an ethnic, national, racial or other group of persons and felony Denial, doubt, approval and justification of genocide,” police press spokesperson Veronika Hyšplerová said.
“This case made it to the officers’ desk at the end of April when a discussant who did his best to speak with the man on a certain level, and who warned him that he should not express himself that way, then filed a crime report against him,” the spokesperson said. The officers then managed to locate the man and to interrogate him.
The man told police he had been full of emotions at the time and was had not been aware that he was breaking the law. He also declared that he regrets expressing himself in those terms.
Should his guilt be proven, the man faces up to three years in prison. “It is important that the public realize any statement that would be criminal in real life is just as criminal in the virtual world,” the police spokesperson warned.
