I know there several threads already about police brutality here, but it's official now.

Geneva police are not nice people

Discuss...

There was a documentary about this on the swiss french TV (TSR). I already mentioned it in this thread:
Swiss Police (Geneva Officers)

Here is the program:
http://www.tsr.ch/tsr/index.html?sit...00#vid=9774323

As well as being terribly violent they also seem to benefit from incredible advantages. For example they only have to work 32 hours per week. Then if they do extra hours, each hour is payed as 10 extra hours. Then for the policemen who don't get to do extra hours there is a special compensation bonus (for not doing extra hours). During the Football Euro they did extra hours and these hours were payed for but they are still claiming an extra 2500 CHF bonus on top of that...UNBELIEVABLE!!!
http://www.tsr.ch/tsr/index.html?sit...05;vid=9868408

Poor Amirimahdi. I hope you all retract your bad rep now.

Right, let's have a go at the Geneva Police and how they do things wrong.
If everyone behaved, we wouldn't need a police in the first place. As far as I know, everyone is made out of the same silly human stuff... and given the right or wrong circumstances and according to how it suits our own sweet selves... we side with the police or with the poor villain.

Erm this isn't a thread for having a police force or against having a police force...
But a thread against police forces that take advantage of their rights and priviledges and abuse of their power.

I think all societies need a police force but a competent one not a "Geneva police force".

Yes, I understood that. have you ever been in the police ???

Why would I? Why should people who break the law and get caught come on a forum, tell us a sob story and expect sympathy? Which, if you remember, is exactly what he did.

This is a bit like if I said: "What happened at Abu Ghraib is wrong." and you answered by saying: "Have you ever been in the US army?"

I haven't been in the police and I haven't been in the US army but I still think that I can judge what is acceptable and what is not.

I have seen some evidence of this the other day. It was in the morning, my husband and I were in the car, just turning into the street behind the Geneva train station when we saw what we thought was some kind of fight.

A man physically attacked another, threw him on the pavement and started beating him. I turned around quickly and saw a woman behind them -- I thought it was the wife or girlfriend of one of them. I was about to dial 117 when I saw the woman pulling out handcuffs and I realised it was two ununiformed police officers restraining and arresting a suspect.

I wondered, if they do this in the middle of the day on a busy street, what methods they may use elsewhere.

Of course, someone may ask me if I have ever been in the police at this point, and the answer would be: thank God, no!

While I think we all agree, that an abusive police force is not asked for, nor acceptable I do have something to add. When I lived in Geneva, I noticed a lot of illegals there (knew one or two myself), also a lot of violent behaviour, from clochards to posh upper class people. I have seen what happens when the Police try to apprehend them, and it's nothing short of kicking, screaming, biting, scratching etc. before they even have been approached or talked to. I know this was only the one case I have seen, but it also led me to understand why some officers might be less reluctant to use force to do their job.

This is in no way to condone violent police behaviour, but I think you are painting a rather one-sided picture there!

I knew that someone would come back with a comment like this.

I only described what I saw and thought. In that particular situation I did not see that the man resisted, kicked or screamed.

Perhaps there is no other way to arrest people, I don't know and I'd rather not find out.

Of course violence is never appropriate to use and it is the most awful thing to watch one human being having a go at another in no matter what circumstances, it is sickening and can never be justified.

It is very easy to say, thank God I am not in the Police, you have a big or small thing go wrong you're probably glad there is the Police you can call for help.

Now, if someone has such a smart solution ready, tested and working, on how to handle any risk situation, to control some freak heads, to avoid any violence ... good. Good.

Sada I understand what you are saying and I agree somewhat. Even situations as the one described by ljm can be described as "borderline".

What cannot be described as borderline are situations like this:
"It [The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture] added that in many cases violence was carried out although the person had already been restrained or handcuffed."

Absolutely out of order, unprofessional, shameful...

Completely agree. What about innocent until proven guilty. If you were in a situation where you were attacked and fighting back to defend yourself, the police arrive on the scene fail to see that and so grabbed you by the neck choking you and then start kicking/attacking you in order to restrain you. It's a bit late when you tell them later that you were the one being attacked when you have broken bones and many months to come where you try to recover. In another thread Starbug tells of defending herself, and rightly so I might add, when she was groped. So, if the police saw her attacking a man it could be her being restrained in the way described in the article here. All you need is some empathy, put yourself in the shoes of an innocent victim, to get it and see that there is restraining and then there is police brutality.. in London, in the 80s, it happened all the time to young black men as the presumption of guilt hung over them every where they went - some even died in police custody.

I don't think the point is whether the Geneva police have a tough job, whether they have to deal with some pretty unsavoury characters, or even whether strong policing is a good or bad thing. The point surely is that the inspection team also visited five other Cantons - Aargau, Bern, Solothurn, Valais and Zurich and didn't receive the same level of complaints about ill treatment. No doubt the police in these Cantons also have a tough job and a strong approach to policing but they don't seem to need to resort to beatings and strangulation to get the job done.

Police in Geneva

Hope they won't get condemned by the "The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture"

My mind does strange connections at times you know,
Geneva - Police - Lyrics of Roxanne - Prostitution - Prevention of Torture - Police violence - Geneva

One of my son is a cop in the toronto police , he had several times broken a bone on tuty and at one time was involved in a shoot out. my advice to him----------can tell ypu

Was swapping travel tales w/ someone at lunch.
He (well to do italian in his 50s) was touring US with his son, and decided to stop to ask a police patrol form some travel directions.
So he curbs the car just "some meters" from the police car, unbelts and starts to open the door. His son yells, he turns to see what it's all about. One officer was pointing a pump action rifle at them, the other one his pistol. Since the car door was already open, he was forced to get out, hands up, put his hand on the roof spread his legs, etc. The two cops were shouting at him all the time. When he finally explained what it was all about, they simply told him not to try to do anything like that again and to get moving.
So much for California, peace & love I suppose.

Then there's the whole thing of the G8 incidents in Genoa, Italy, where many protesters - and most of them weren't the "black block" anarchists - were abused by the hands of the italian anti-riot police...

So I guess there's nothing really "new" to this piece of new re. the geneva police, but it's always sad to have to realize that there must obviously be some kind of catalyst within civil society that triggers this kind of heavy handed police culture

Paul