Many of us probably still remember very well what happened last year at the C0 canal construction site, when a landowner was arrested and beaten up in the water catchment protection area, where Mayor Zoran Janković wants to build a sewer, despite the opposing opinions of the experts. As a result of the police’s conduct, Aleš Mrzel decided to file a criminal complaint against the Assistant Chief of the Bežigrad Police Station, who was appointed head of assistance at the time, and the police officer who punched him in the face. The District Public Prosecutor has now decided to dismiss the criminal complaint, as he does not believe that there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the two suspects committed a crime against the landowner in question.
In the first half of December, we reported on the violent behaviour of the police – they forcibly arrested and took away a landowner in the area of the C0 canal. The violent behaviour of the police was also filmed, and the victim was kept under observation at the University Medical Centre that day due to his injuries and was then kept on sick leave for a few days. One witness told the national media outlet Radio-Television Slovenia (RTVS) that they were standing on a plot of land that was not at all questionable and not even intended for construction – that is, away from the main action – but one of the owners of the plots in the area was nonetheless stopped by the police, and when he called out, “Emergency,” it started. “They went at him like animals,” said the witness.
Mrzel froze in fear
The landowner who filed the criminal complaint said that on the 14th of December last year, he had come to his neighbour from Ježica to help him fix a problem with the tractor. He said that activities related to surveying work were taking place in the vicinity, but not on his neighbour’s plot of land. The victim was suddenly spotted there by the assistant chief of the Bežigrad Police Station – he pointed his hand at the unsuspecting man and ordered his subordinates to bring him in, the landowner revealed. “I was surprised and stood on the spot, not expecting it to be a kidnapping,” said Aleš Mrzel.
“I cowered in fear because the enforcers could have even used weapons and other means of coercion. One of the enforcers raised a baton, another took guard, my legs were kicked, and six heavy men lifted me up and carried me away. After a few steps, I was let go so that I fell on the ground, then I was restrained with a vice-like grip, then I lost consciousness for quite some time, and after a while, I found myself in a police vehicle with handcuffs on my hands. In between, I bled profusely from a blow to the face from a policeman. At the Bežigrad Police Station, I was about to faint and, with blood streaming down my face, I was unable to read or sign some papers that the accused pushed in front of my face,” Mrzel wrote in his report, adding that at the insistence of his relatives and friends, the police officers “gave in” to putting him in a private car and escorting him to medical care, where he was given the necessary scans and examinations and detained in the ward.
Aleš Mrzel accused the Assistant Chief of the Ljubljana Bežigrad Police Station, Janez Geč, of several criminal offences (offences under Articles 145, 146 and 147 of the Criminal Code). He accused Geč of “ordering a kidnapping, ordering for him to be dragged away from private property, ordering subordinate police officers to strangle his neck, ordering punches to be delivered in a boxing style, ordering boarding in a service vehicle, in the premises of the police station, ordering verbal and physical ill-treatment, ordering others to force me to give signatures on unknown documents, to prevent medical assistance, to prevent assistance from relatives and acquaintances, and to prevent and impede the picking up by my relatives and acquaintances for the purpose of first aid, ordering to secretly accompany the applicant to the University Medical Centre and other attempts to obstruct him in front of a medical facility”. According to the District Public Prosecutor Luka Viranto of the Specialised Public Prosecutor’s Office, it follows logically from Mrzel’s accusations that the landowner is accusing Geč of committing the offences of unlawful deprivation of liberty under Article 133(1)(2) of the Criminal Code and the offence of violation of human dignity by abuse of official position under Article 266 of the Criminal Code (not the offences under Articles 145, 146 and 147 of the Criminal Code, which are mentioned in the criminal complaint).
A video of the arrest, which Mrzel says is more than eloquent, can also be found on the internet.
With regard to the allegation concerning the police officer of the Police Station Ljubljana Bežigrad, Danijel Grušovnik, the District Public Prosecutor initially pointed out that the Police and Security Directorate (DPDVN) had informed the Prosecutor’s office that the Appeals Chamber of the Ministry of the Interior had decided on the merits of the complaints of Aleš Mrzel and others concerning the conduct of the police in providing assistance to the Municipality of Ljubljana (MOL) on the 14th of December 2022. “The members of the Chamber decided that one ground of appeal was well-founded, namely that the police officer Danijel Grušovnik, while restraining the complainant, when he was actively and passively resisting, had unprofessionally punched the complainant in the face, which constituted an excess of physical force and caused physical injury to the complainant. It follows from the above that the police officer Danijel Grušovnik was charged with the offence of violation of human dignity by abuse of official position under Article 266 of the Criminal Code,” he stressed.
Grounds for dismissal according to the District Public Prosecutor
The District Attorney then recalled that the Municipality of Ljubljana had requested police assistance in connection with the construction of the C0 canal. According to him, as all the reasons and circumstances for this had been provided, the police assistance had been granted, and Geč had been appointed as the head of the assistance. “Having examined all the evidence, I find that the allegations made by the accuser in his written criminal complaint have not been confirmed in any way. The procedure of providing police assistance on the critical day in question was carried out in accordance with the regulations, police powers were used in accordance with the regulations, and the police officers acted in a correct, courteous and professional manner towards the accuser (and everyone else at the scene), and during the procedure, the accuser actively resisted the lawful orders of the police officers, twice refused medical assistance, refused to sign and be served the documents with various excuses, and unnecessarily delayed the proceedings,” the Prosecutor pointed out in relation to the grounds for dismissal of the case against the assistant chief of the Ljubljana Bežigrad Police Station.
According to the Prosecutor, the accuser was intentionally misleading by stating the reason for his presence at the scene, as, according to the Prosecutor, it was clearly evident from the recordings that he was there for the reason of opposition to the execution of the works by the construction workers engaged by the Municipality of Ljubljana. “He was also intentionally misleading by stating that he did not know why police officers were at the scene, as it is clear from the recordings that Janez Geč had previously informed the police of their role (assisting the Municipality of Ljubljana) and asked them to remove themselves from the scene several times over a megaphone. He was further misleading by alleging that the police officers “kidnapped” him, used a baton and stood on guard, that he lost consciousness and only regained consciousness in the police vehicle, that his face was badly bloodied and that he was unable to read or even sign the “papers” that were allegedly pushed in front of his face.”
According to the Prosecutor, Mrzel made further misleading statements about the police – namely, “about the fact that the police officers prevented his family and friends from taking him away from the police station in order to provide him with medical assistance, as he arbitrarily remained in the premises of the Police Station Ljubljana Bežigrad after the detention was lifted, allegedly awaiting the arrival of a forensic expert in traumatology to examine him, while at the same time refusing the medical assistance offered”. The falsity of Mrzel’s allegations was allegedly proven by the footage of the scene, the footage of the police proceedings and the footage from the Bežigrad Police Station. “In view of the above, there is no reasonable suspicion that the police officers unlawfully deprived the accuser of his liberty and unlawfully used coercive means against him on the orders of Janez Geč, and consequently, there is no reasonable suspicion that Janez Geč committed the offences alleged against him,” the Prosecutor concluded.
“In regards to the use of a professional punch by the police officer Grušovnik, which was assessed by the Ljubljana Police Department as unprofessional, however, after examining all the above-mentioned evidence, I am of the opinion that there is no reasonable suspicion that this police officer intentionally punched the denouncer in the face,” the Prosecutor explained the reason for his dismissal of the criminal complaint against the police officer in question. According to him, the latter’s use of coercive means was based on Geč’s order and on the failure of the accuser to comply with the police officers’ orders and on his passive and active resistance. According to the Prosecutor, the complainant was warned of the use of police powers, informed of the grounds for arrest, and coercive measures were used for non-compliance with the orders.
“With a professional punch, the police officer tried to hit the complainant in the plexus area, but hit him in the face instead, because the denouncer resisted on the ground by moving, kicking and shaking his head all around. It is therefore clear from the above explanation that officer Grušovnik missed his target with the blow and that he thus unintentionally hit the accuser in the face. Taking into account the established conduct of the complainant, such an explanation by the police officer is, in my opinion, convincing and can be followed,” the Prosecutor believes. In his opinion, the punch to the complainant’s face was not intentional, which, he says, is why there is no reasonable suspicion that the officer committed the offence he had been accused of.
Mrzel, who believes that the recordings of last year’s arrest are more than revealing, has the right to initiate criminal proceedings against the suspect himself within 30 days of receiving the decision, by filing a request for an investigation or a direct indictment with the District Court in Ljubljana if he disagrees with the rejection of the verdict. It should be noted that after his arrest, the police sent Mrzel a fine for committing offences under Article 7, paragraph 2, and Article 22, paragraph 1, of the Protection of Public Order Act. The fine was accompanied by a “brief description of the facts of the offence, including evidence”, as well as a detention order, a notice of the detainee’s rights and a report on the ambulance transport. As if the physical consequences of the arrest and detention were not enough, Mrzel has already had to pay 751.12 euros for all of this. Janković has since continued to build the C0 canal, although the profession disputes this, and the floods have proved that the canal is leaking badly.
A. H.
