Here are some examples of Turkish poliçe brutality that I witnessed while in custody in 2006 - "The cop driver was now in his element, surrounded by sadistic warders, and leered and loomed above me, threatening me and kicking me. “God is watching,” I told him, and he dragged me out onto the stairs and cuffed me around the head and pulled my beard, saying he could easily smash my face against the wall, me with my hands still linked behind my back." "This morning, sitting in the reception hall, as I was finishing writing my rhyming couplet playlet ‘The King’s New Clothes’ – (finished! And good, I think,) they dragged a guy out of the lockup (one who had been working as a kind of trustee, clearing up, serving tea and bringing deliveries.) Apparently they’d found some narcotic stuff hidden in a tube of toothpaste. He was carted off into the stairwell by the particularly nasty group of cops on duty today, who kicked and beat the shit out of him. Later they did the same to a guy accused of stealing someone’s money in the lockup. As they dragged him out, one cop who didn’t even know the charge slapped him really hard twice across the face and another punched him as he was carted off to the stairwell, one grabbing a baton along the way. I think he prodded the guy in the chest or stomach with it, because I heard him coughing and rasping as though winded. And later this afternoon twice, two troops of new prisoners arrived. As they were let onto this floor, the chief cop (older than the others, and who had been polite and courteous to me before, making me think he might be a nice man,) was waiting at the gate, kicking viciously at the poor souls as they came running in one by one, sending some sprawling across the floor, much to the delight of the other cops, who laughed and applauded. Obviously his party trick. The last was a group of small-sized Bangladeshis, who are now seated cowering on the stairs, waiting to go through the humiliation of being frisked and barked out by the (just as nasty) cops on duty tonight. They’ve already been slapped and beaten upstairs. Welcome to Turkey!" "At 11 pm everyone was sneezing and coughing because one of the cops sprayed pepper-spray in the face of a bolshie detainee – very clever in such a confined space. So - all these extra people are going into the lockup with those already there, which will bring the number up to about 500!" "Earlier last night, with the lockup so full, there sounded like what might have turned into a riot, with screaming, shouting, chanting and banging from the prisoners inside. I lay and listened and imagined the barking sadists charging in with their batons being seized by the furious inmates and torn limb from limb in revenge for their brutality. A bit unchristian of me perhaps, but it didn’t happen." "The new lot on tonight is a nasty lot again. I heard some slapping and banging in the hall and went out to investigate but was told to go back into the office and sit down. A little later a Pakistani with a bleeding nose was escorted upstairs, splashing blood on the way, cleaned up with a mop by one of the trustees…." "They don’t like to see me watching. The other day the chief took some men into the office for a slapping while I was in the hall, but positioned so I could see through the door. He told me to move my seat further away. “But I can still hear!” I warned defiantly as I shifted out of eyesight. Apart from the meanies there are the wishy-washy ones who don’t hit, but smile on the antics of the others, and don’t criticize them." From my account: authonomy/books/40231/in-jail-in-istanbul/
Posted on: Tue, 25 Jun 2013 08:56:50 +0000
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