Two ertzainas will go to trial for illegal detention and false documentation in the arrest of a young man in Bilbao
Two ertzainas will go to trial for illegal detention and false documentation in the arrest of a young man in Bilbao
A court in Bilbao has prosecuted two ertzainas for illegal detention and false documents in the arrest of a young man in the center of the Biscayan capital. In the instruction appears a video recorded by the detainee’s friends, in which it is clearly seen how the agents, who were in civilian clothes, act violently against the young man, who at no time attacks the police.
The judge discredits the statement that the agents wrote, in which they assured that he maintains an “active resistance” and that he tries to attack them. “No aggressive behavior of the complainant is observed in the recording, nor that he laid hands on the agents as indicated in the report and if a merely passive behavior”, points out the order issued on July 14 by the court of instruction number 6 of Bilbao. said resolution It supposes the conclusion of the judicial investigation and safely opens the entire opening of an oral trial, pending resolution of the appeal presented by the defense of the ertzainas.
After this order, the Biscay Prosecutor’s Office took the author of the recording as a witness, who confirmed that the young man did not try to attack the ertzainas and that the agents did not identify themselves as such.
The incident occurred more than a year ago, in June 2021, at 2 in the morning in the Bilbao neighborhood of Deusto. According to the state of the ertzainas, who were working in plain clothes, caught the attention of a young man who had entered a fenced construction area and tried to get into a bulldozer. After being announced of that fact, the young man said it was a joke and it was over.
Then, adds the statement, several of his friends got to rebuke the police, who they claimed identified as stories. One of the young people is ordered to put on a mask (it was mandatory at the time due to the pandemic situation) and he will identify himself. Given his refusal, he stops the young man and ensures that he maintains an “active resistance” and that he tries to attack them.
In the video, which lasts just over two minutes, the friends warn the two Ertzainas, that they keep the young man immobilized against a closed shutter of a local, that they are recording what happened and that he is going to provide them with the DNI. One of the ertzainas threatens the victim with the phrase “I’ll break your knee” and shortly after punches him twice in the abdomen.
“This is not necessary,” implores one of the friends. “That it was a mistake”, they insist. However, the plainclothes officers continue to immobilize the young man, who only complains about what they are doing to him and doubts that they are Ertzainas. The affected party has assured, during the judicial investigation of the case, that at no time did they identify themselves as police officers.
Shortly after, the agents throw the young man to the ground. The affected had already asked his friends to call the Ertzaintza and at that moment a uniformed agent appears. The friends tell the ertzaina that “They have threatened to break his knee. I have it all recorded”.
After the incident, the young man is transferred to the Ertzaintza police station in Deusto for the crime of attacking law enforcement officers. In this type of arrest, the usual thing is the transfer from the police station to the court, but the young man is released hours later.
The ertzainas filed a complaint in the courts and their statement was ratified. The young man’s defense presented the video and the court of instruction number 9, upon seeing the recording, immediately filed the case, considering the testimonies of the ertzainas to be false.
In the filing order, issued on August 15 of last year, the judge points out that “an irrefutable element of evidence has been provided to the case: the recording made by a friend of the person under investigation. In it, it is seen how both agents hold (the young man) against a shutter of an establishment, and how they hit him in the ribs and put the baton to his neck, being a situation in which no disturbance of order is observed. public”.
The judge considers that “no action is observed” of the young man “trying to grab the agents, or throwing them to the ground, or trying to get away; It is true that he insults them at some point (a meritorious fact, if anything, an administrative sanction, not a criminal reproach, as well as the refusal to give him his ID) and that several times he tells his friends to call the police ”. For this reason, “not accrediting the facts collected in the report, the file of the case proceeds”.
The affected person filed a complaint in June against the two ertzainas for illegal detention, false testimony and false complaint. On June 18, the investigating court number 6 of Bilbao opened an investigation and took statements on the 30th from the two ertzainas.
In their testimony, the agents alluded that there was an attack on the young woman prior to the recording, but they cannot justify the “active resistance” that they described in the report, the fact that they threw her to the ground (instead of the young man, as reflects the report) and the reasons why they had him immobilized and even attacked him when the affected party was willing to provide them with his DNI.
Now, court number 6 has concluded the investigation and has decided to prosecute the two ertzainas for illegal detention and false documents. Assumes the considerations of court number 9 that there is no aggressive behavior towards the agents and that the young man maintains a “merely passive attitude”.
The court order is forceful when considering that two ertzainas committed the crimes of illegal detention and false documentation in the arrest of a young man in Bilbao. The magistrate discredits the police report that accused the young man of attempted assault on the agents. A video recorded by his friends has been the key evidence to determine the falsity of the police report, something that should never happen to public officials. Now, there are two prosecuted Ertzainas who will continue to sit, in all probability, on the defendant’s bench in an oral trial. May all this serve to eradicate these practices that, unfortunately, still persist.