Georgian Democracy Initiative is responding to the fact of detention of three citizens by the police on the night of June 28, 2014. As revealed from the news item prepared by Tabula TV station and statements of eye witnesses, the police officers presumably exceeded their authority and violated the law during and after the detention. Besides, according to the eye witnesses, the police officers assaulted the detainees physically, as a result of which one of the detainees bears an injury in the facial area.
Georgian Democracy Initiative calls on the Chief Prosecutor’s Office of Georgia to launch an investigation into the aforementioned fact immediately.
As revealed from the eye witness accounts, the police officers conducted a search of the car on the pretext that, according to the information they had, the car contained weapons. The persons who were sitting in the car protested the search, in response to which the police officers detained three persons. It was only found out later that they had been detained under Article 173 of the Administrative Code which envisages administrative responsibility for disobedience to a demand of an employee of a law enforcement body. The police officers did not explain to them the cause of their detention and their rights when they were detaining them. According to the eye witnesses, the police officers behaved rudely and provocatively.
It is noteworthy that, according to one of the persons on the spot, at the time of detention, the police officers exerted physical pressure on one of the detainees, hitting him in the face while they were putting him in the car. The news item aired on Tabula TV station clearly shows that one of the detainees bears a bruise in the area of the left eye, which, according to the eye witnesses, he had not borne before the detention. The detainees were initially transferred to a police station where they were kept for several hours, after which they were transferred to take a drug test.
While at the police station, the detainees were not allowed to exercise the right to counsel, which is one of the basic rights of detainees. The footage clearly shows several attempts of the lawyer of the Tabula TV station to go into the police station and talk to a detainee, in response to which he gets cynical treatment from a police officer.
According to the Netgazeti Web edition, the Ministry of Internal Affairs has stated that “the police were acting within the limits of law, because they were not informed that a lawyer was on the spot and wanted to meet with a detainee.” http://www.netgazeti.ge/GE/105/News/33169/
It should also be mentioned that the lawyer called the General Inspection whose representatives did not show up on the spot, but later the Ministry of Internal Affairs told Netgazeti that representatives of the General Inspection of the MIA had been on the spot.
The trial of the detainees was held in the Tbilisi City Court on Sunday, June 29, and lasted formore than five hours. The interests of the employee of the Tabula TV station and the two persons who were detained together with him are defended by the Georgian Young Lawyers Association. The detainees are being tied for interfering with the police. The court will declare its decision on July 1.
