KDH: Police Brutality Increasing with Vanishing Morale in Police Corps

Bratislava, November 13 (TASR) - The opposition Christian Democratic Movement (KDH) on Wednesday said that it demands that criminal liability should be strictly enforced in a recent case in which a Kosice police officer has been accused of manslaughter. "We will ask the Interior Minister and the leadership of the Police Corps how it is possible that they are failing to manage the sector, what measures they will take and what they will do to ensure that the police maintain law and order so that people don't have to fear the police force," KDH vice-chair Viliam Karas said. According to Karas, the Police Corps is losing its ability to detect crime. "The morale and orderliness in the Police Corps is also vanishing, which is resulting in an increase in police brutality," opined Karas. KDH warned of a disintegration in the police force, not only because of recent resignations of police officers, but also because of reforms introduced by Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok (Voice-SD) and the new leadership of the Police Corps. An investigator of the Interior Ministry's Inspectorate (UIS) on Tuesday pressed charges of manslaughter against a Kosice police officer. According to the Inspectorate, the officer in question, while on duty in early November, inflicted multiple injuries to the head and body of an individual detained while perpetrating a crime, with the detainee succumbing to the injuries in hospital the following day. If found guilty, the officer might be sentenced to 12-15 years in prison. The House defence and security committee is expected to discuss the incident on Thursday. zel/mcs