Two police officers arrested for assaulting and injuring a detainee in Barcelona given bail
Police force has dismissed both officers and is investigating four more for the same intervention
BarcelonaA police intervention by the Catalan police force, known as the Mossos d'Esquadra, following an altercation in a bar in Barcelona's Eixample at the end of last year has ended with the arrest of two officers and four more under investigation. The police officers allegedly arrested a man, but instead of taking him directly to the police station, allegedly held him, abused him and beat him. The duty judge has provisionally sent the two arrested officers to prison and has set a €6,000.
Should they deposit the money, their passports will be withdrawn and they will be forbidden to leave the State and to get within 1,000 metres of the victim nor to communicate with him by any means. The other four police officers under investigation will be summoned later to testify before the judge who is conducting the case.
The six officers are part of a citizen security unit, tasked with patrolling and serving the public on the street. As SER Catalunya has reported, at the end of 2021 the investigated police officers were called to a gay bar in Eixample as a man was causing a disturbance. According to the this man's complaint, the officers arrested him but instead of taking him to the police station, they retained him, assaulted him and harassed him and ended up leaving him in the middle of the street shouting "get raped".
Disciplinary file
The Mossos d'Esquadra's Internal Affairs Division (DAI), which has reviewed the intervention and made the arrests of two of the six officers on Thursday, has initiated disciplinary proceedings against the six police officers involved in the intervention under suspicion and has suspended the two arrested officers, whom it holds responsible for the crimes of illegal detention, torture and battery. To the other four are being investigated for the first two offences.
