A police officer from the Berlin police (symbol image) Photo: dpa
From BZ/epd
The new Ombudsman and Police Commissioner for the State of Berlin, Alexander Oerke, wants to raise awareness of discriminatory behavior by law enforcement officers.
“It’s about protection, sometimes with repressive means, and not about harassment,” he told the “Berliner Morgenpost” (Monday). Such behavior belittles the reputation of the police. Their task is to treat everyone fairly, non-discriminatoryly and decently.
Unfortunately, there has always been discrimination, said Oerke in relation to allegations that people are controlled particularly frequently or intensively because of their ethnicity or skin color. Fortunately, this misconduct is now being made much more public. “Those who act accordingly as police officers must be made aware that this behavior is improper and illegal because there is no criminalistic requirement for it and there should not be,” he added.
He cannot yet judge whether these are isolated cases or a structural problem, said Oerke. If the latter were the case, action would have to be taken, for example by focusing even more on the issue in police training.
Oerke has been Ombudsman and Police Commissioner for the State of Berlin since August 1st.