Jaroslav Miko on the death of a Romani man after a police intervention: It is legitimate to demand the entire incident be investigated

During the recent incident in Teplice a young person died. Let’s set aside, for the moment, the intervention by the police, or whether it was adequate given the situation and the state of health of the detainee, or whether different methods could have been used to arrest this suspect, or whether the intervention did or did not have a direct influence on his demise.

The people whose competencies and expertise allow them to assess those questions objectively should do so. Speaking for myself, I would just like to say that calling for the investigation of this entire incident is an absolutely legitimate demand. 

What is predominating on social media, however, once again, are cheap judgments that the person involved was “just a drug addict”, or even that he was “a mere Rom”, so what is there to be addressed? People generally like to make such cheap judgments about others. 

Most probably these people have the feeling that they themselves are superior when they make such judgments. We don’t know why this person used drugs, what his childhood was like, what his intellect was like, what his living conditions were like. 

By saying this I am not defending the use of narcotics, I am just trying to say that people who are addicted to alcohol or drugs are more in need of our help than our judgment. This person decidedly did not deserve to die and at a minimum, if anybody still has any basic empathy for the relatives of the deceased or respect for human life in general, then they should refrain from such cheap public judgments – and if they are high-level politicians, that applies even more.

The fact that the person involved was Romani should never have been and cannot be a reason to make light of his death. I know we do not live in an ideal world and it’s not possible to prevent such unfair attitudes, but I feel the need to publicly state my views on this.