Interview with journalist Wagenschein reporting Genoa jail conditions
taz | 27.07.2001 18:27
English translation of the TAZ interview with german journalist Kirsten Wagenschein, who witnessed acts of extreme cruelty while held captive in Italian police barracks
Psychoterror, violence and abritrary treatment
Yesterday, after five days in an Italian prison, Berlin journalist Kirsten Wagenschein was released. She is being accused of possession of arms and of being part of the 'Black Block'
taz: When were you arrested?
Kirsten Wagenschein: I was talking with the people in the school opposite the Genoa Social Forum [center] about their impressions of the day. Suddenly we heard people calling: "Police!" Everybody panicked and started looking for ways to escape. I hid in a broom closet, and heard cries and the sound of beatings going on, and I was afraid. Then three policemen made me come out of the broom closet. My official press identification papers were ignored.
taz: Were you mistreated?
I myself wasn't beaten. But half of the seventy people arrested were injured; many were lying on the floor with head injuries and covered in blood, and hardly moved anymore, they only moaned. Blood was everywhere. Police broke a young woman's jaw and smashed out her front teeth. Immigrants with a dark skin were mistreated in a particularly extreme manner.
taz: You were in the police barracks until monday morning.
Kirsten Wagenschein: There was an unbelievable mixture of psychoterror, violence and arbitrary treatment. We had to stand for hours with our legs spread and our faces to the wall. Women and men with broken arms and legs too. The police hit us with batons and kicked us with their boots. On my way to the toilet I saw a man being beaten up in another cell. He was lying on the ground, and the policeman hit him again and again with his baton, in the stomach, raised the baton high and kept hitting him. The man cried and cried.
We had no contact whatsoever with the outside world. When I was transferred to a women's prison it felt like a relieve, because there the only thing that continued was the bureaucracy.
taz: What about the legal consequences?
Kirsten Wagenschein: When I appeared before the court on wednesday - and there were translators and representatives - I was presented with three charges: membership of the international organisation Black Block, possession of arms, and resisting arrest. All these charges are ridiculous, but the last one is exceptionally cynical. Nobody resisted arrest, because all of us where scared to death.
It's hard to predict if there will really be a trial. But anyway I am not allowed to enter Italy for five years.
Yesterday, after five days in an Italian prison, Berlin journalist Kirsten Wagenschein was released. She is being accused of possession of arms and of being part of the 'Black Block'
taz: When were you arrested?
Kirsten Wagenschein: I was talking with the people in the school opposite the Genoa Social Forum [center] about their impressions of the day. Suddenly we heard people calling: "Police!" Everybody panicked and started looking for ways to escape. I hid in a broom closet, and heard cries and the sound of beatings going on, and I was afraid. Then three policemen made me come out of the broom closet. My official press identification papers were ignored.
taz: Were you mistreated?
I myself wasn't beaten. But half of the seventy people arrested were injured; many were lying on the floor with head injuries and covered in blood, and hardly moved anymore, they only moaned. Blood was everywhere. Police broke a young woman's jaw and smashed out her front teeth. Immigrants with a dark skin were mistreated in a particularly extreme manner.
taz: You were in the police barracks until monday morning.
Kirsten Wagenschein: There was an unbelievable mixture of psychoterror, violence and arbitrary treatment. We had to stand for hours with our legs spread and our faces to the wall. Women and men with broken arms and legs too. The police hit us with batons and kicked us with their boots. On my way to the toilet I saw a man being beaten up in another cell. He was lying on the ground, and the policeman hit him again and again with his baton, in the stomach, raised the baton high and kept hitting him. The man cried and cried.
We had no contact whatsoever with the outside world. When I was transferred to a women's prison it felt like a relieve, because there the only thing that continued was the bureaucracy.
taz: What about the legal consequences?
Kirsten Wagenschein: When I appeared before the court on wednesday - and there were translators and representatives - I was presented with three charges: membership of the international organisation Black Block, possession of arms, and resisting arrest. All these charges are ridiculous, but the last one is exceptionally cynical. Nobody resisted arrest, because all of us where scared to death.
It's hard to predict if there will really be a trial. But anyway I am not allowed to enter Italy for five years.
taz