Czech ‘George Floyd case’ raises questions about treatment of Romany minority

Police treatment of the Roma community has been put in the spotlight by a shocking incident, reports William Nattrass in Prague

A video showing a police officer appearing to kneel on the neck of a Romany man, who later died in an ambulance, is raising urgent questions about discrimination against the Czech Republic’s Roma community.

The video, shot in Teplice in the northwest of the country, on 19 June, shows two police officers holding 46-year-old Stanislav Tomáš to the ground.

One officer pins down the man’s feet, while the other appears to kneel on his neck. Disturbing screams and groans punctuate the five-minute ordeal, which comes to an end with Tomáš lying limply on the pavement. He died in an ambulance soon afterwards.

The video has spread like wildfire through Czech social media, with many noting the eerie similarity of the officers’ methods to the treatment of George Floyd. The incident has meanwhile raised similar questions about police aggression towards the Roma community, who remain a deeply marginalised group in Czech society.

The police quickly defended the officers, saying Tomáš died as a result of the methamphetamine in his system rather than the force.

“No ‘Czech George Floyd’”, the official police twitter account posted on Monday, citing a preliminary post-mortem showing “pathological changes to the coronary arteries” associated with amphetamine use.

Police said force was used because Tomáš scratched and bit them when they approached him after he was reported for being involved in a fight in which cars were damaged.

Interior Minister Jan Hamáček supported the officers involved, saying the police are entitled to respond to people under the influence of drugs and that anyone breaking the law “must expect that the Czech police will intervene”. Prime Minister Andrej Babiš meanwhile said he stands “100 per cent” behind the officers involved.

Questions are nevertheless being asked about whether their use of force was excessive. Amnesty International has called on the Czech authorities to carry out an investigation into police actions which it considers “abusive and unlawful”, noting that even if the man died due to intoxication, police actions may have been “a contributory factor without which death would not have occurred”.

Yet the speed with which the authorities have closed ranks in response to accusations of police brutality is seen by many as symptomatic of institutional discrimination faced by Romany people.

“Their message is that the procedure was justified because Stanislav Tomáš was aggressive and under the influence of drugs. None of them express regret for his death, or offer their sincere condolences to his family,” Renata Berkyová, an expert in Roma history from the Czech Republic’s Institute of Contemporary History, told The Independent.

“Of course, such an approach only deepens the divide between the Roma in the Czech Republic and state forces.”

In the Czech Republic, the notion of ‘Roma crime’ is widespread. Articles and studies have been published on how Romany people behave, and how to act against them. Does this mean the police intervene differently against Romany people – or that they should?

Renata Berkyová, an expert in Roma history from the Czech Republic’s Institute of Contemporary History

At a press conference held on Thursday afternoon, local police representatives repeated their stance that “legitimate and lawful procedures were used”. They said the autopsy showed no signs of organ injury or suffocation as the cause of death, and noted that the officers tried to placate Tomáš several times before the events shown in the video.

“He was endangering himself and others, as well as property,” said Zbyněk Dvořák, deputy regional police director. “He reacted to several attempts to end the operation with resistance and increased aggression.”

When contacted by The Independent, the police declined to comment further on the incident.

This is not the first time the Czech police force has been linked to the death of a Romany person. In 2016, Miroslav Demeter died after a conflict with customers in a pizzeria led to police intervention in which several people, including a police officer, kneeled on the prostrate man.

“It would probably be unfair to over-generalise about ill-treatment of Roma people by the police, but it is important to look at the bigger picture,” says Berkyová.

“In the Czech Republic, the notion of ‘Roma crime’ is widespread. Articles and studies have been published on how Romany people behave, and how to act against them. Does this mean the police intervene differently against Romany people – or that they should?” she added.

Such attitudes towards Roma crime form just one part of the community’s painfully apparent lack of integration into mainstream Czech society.

There are some 250,000 Roma in the Czech Republic out of a population of 10.6 million. Low educational attainment is a particular problem: a 2018 report found an astonishingly high number of early school leavers among Romany people, with 72 per cent of Romany children leaving school early, compared with a national average of 6.7 per cent.

Unemployment rates are also significantly higher among the Roma community than the population as a whole, while a 2012 survey found that more than 60 per cent of Romany respondents claimed they had experienced racial discrimination in the workplace.

There is frustration about the continued inability to bridge the divide on both sides. In February this year, Ombudsman Stanislav Křeček caused outrage among Romany people by saying their issues with finding housing arise not from discrimination, but because they “devastate the housing stock and turn sections of municipalities into excluded localities.”

Indeed, recent studies continue to show negative perceptions of the co-existence of Roma and non-Roma people in the Czech Republic, with a 2015 survey finding 84 per cent of Czechs have a negative view, and 64 per cent of those who live near Romany people describe the experience as bad.

Moreover, the survey suggested Czech perceptions of Romany people are getting worse, not better.

Many note the lack of positive role models for Romany people as a cause for their continued alienation. Back in 1990, there were eight Roma MPs in the Czechoslovak parliament – in today’s Czech parliament, there are none.

With the Teplice case now being investigated by forensic scientists and the police’s Internal Control Department, it is hoped greater clarity about Tomáš’s cause of death will be forthcoming.

But ‘Czech George Floyd’ or not, the harrowing video has brought the Czech Republic’s continued problem with the integration of its Roma community to the fore.