Slovakia: Police who vulgarly humiliated and insulted Romani children to face trial once more
After the Slovak Constitutional Court overturned the acquittal of 10 police officers charged with abusing their powers and extorting Romani children, their case has been returned to the Košice Municipal Court. On Wednesday, 5 August, a new trial opened in which the injured parties, now adults, participated.
The officers themselves did not attend the hearing. The TASR news agency reported on the trial.
The incident sparked outrage among the public and the international community; it happened in March 2009 at a Košice police station. Six Romani boys between the ages of 10 and 16 were taken there on suspicion of having robbed a female pensioner.
A video recording of the incident that later was publicized shows the officers humiliating the boys, forcing them to beat each other up and to strip naked, ordering canine units to attack them and insulting them with vulgarities because of their Romani origin. The Prosecutor-General brought charges in 2010 against nine male officers and one female.
The court finally acquitted them in December 2019 and the appellate court upheld the verdict one year later. The court ruled that it had not been proven that those charged had committed criminal acts.
The injured parties complained to the Constitutional Court, which overturned those verdicts. During this retrial, the attorney for the injured parties, Vanda Durbáková, asked for a change to the composition of the first-instance panel of judges due to the length of the previous decision and the way it was handled.
The panel, led by Judge Daniela Poprocká, rejected that request. The protocol of the original police interrogation of the accused was read aloud at the hearing and the defense then moved for the injured parties to be questioned again.
The court has not yet decided whether that will happen. The trial will continue on 13 October with the questioning of the two officers who conducted the original interrogations in the case.
The accused officers claim their behavior was not illegal and that they caused the boys no harm. The injured parties, on the other hand, claim they were bullied and intimidated.
The case also has an international dimension. The European Court of Human Rights ruled Slovakia violated the boys’ rights and awarded them compensation in the amount of EUR 20,000.
