The story of George Floyd, a man killed by the police because they believed he had used a fraudulent $20 note, has triggered international protests against the mistreatment of Black members of our communities. Whilst this story is a shocking event, what is more shocking is the number of accounts of racial abuse that are untold but experienced every day.
At Stozzys we are in full support of the Black Lives Matter movement and are committed to hearing and publishing stories from all members of our community. We are very grateful for the contributions we are receiving and hope that any member of society can feel the benefits of expressing their story, however we appreciate that for some people sharing a true life story can be traumatising (particularly those who are victims of racial abuse or racism). We hope that the anonymity we provide when publishing stories can provide a space for those who wish to share their stories to do so in a way which they feel is safe, whilst deploring the fact that society doesn’t provide a safe space for all voices.
We stand wholeheartedly in solidarity with the Black community at this moment in time and always. In this blog post you can read a first hand account of a group of friends being stopped and searched on the way to catch a flight, both without grounds and in a humiliating and aggressive manner; a way no person should be treated.
For white people reading this story, we ask you to focus not on whether or not Black community members deserve to be treated as such. Instead ask why preconceptions are applied to a person solely based on the colour of their skin. Ask why whiteness has led to – and supports – systems which provide a space for racially incentivised aggression. We are hopeful that once we begin to look at ourselves and understand the answers to these questions we can create real waves of change.
Stop and search
What do the police stand for?
Now before I start, I assure you this isn’t an anti-police, anti-authority rant, because I do understand their usefulness and importance when implemented correctly. Instead, this is my account of an encounter I had, along with three other friends whilst visiting a European city I will call C. I invite you to read with unbiased views either side and challenge aspects of the story in your head.
The motto of the police in the country I visited is ‘freedom under the law’, which implies if you abide by the law, you are free.
Well either way, recent events had led me to believe that this is not the case.
I have lived in London my whole life, but I am currently studying at University elsewhere. Through my course I had the option to live, work and study in another country for a year, and so I worked hard to make it happen. After spending a year working in C, I fell in love with the place, and the amazing people I had met.
I decided to return to visit some friends as I was considering applying for a PhD there. That weekend, which had been filled with so much happiness, was completely ruined at the end by police officers who had absolutely no respect, no integrity and lacked common courtesy.
Enough background, it’s story time.
A car of four people was heading to the airport and it was pulled over. Now according to the local police commissioner who contacted me when I was back in England, about 50 cars are stopped daily, so it just so happens that we were unfortunate. (We’ll come back to this policeman later).
But what startled me was the reason behind being stopped, which was ‘not being able to see who was driving’. This is absurd, considering it was dark and gets dark by 5pm, so by that logic several other cars should have been stopped- especially motorcyclists since helmets completely prevent police from ‘seeing who’s driving’.
Nevertheless, we stopped. After handing over ID, the police found nothing wrong with the vehicle or the license of the driver. One would assume this would be sufficient to allow us to continue our journey to the airport.
Instead, they told the driver and the individual the passenger seat to get out, as they were to be searched.
They proceeded to search the two people from the front of the car, by the side of a busy road, in which several bystanders began to watch. These searches included a search of the penis and anus. Which is incredibly embarrassing, indecent, and irrational since there were no real grounds for this search.
I went on my phone to check the time, rather rudely and abruptly the officer demanded that I put my phone away until this was over. I didn’t know why this was necessary but was reluctant to challenge, based on ‘horror’ stories I’ve heard about the police in this country.
Shortly after, two more police officers came, to search me and my friend who was also in the back of the car.
After asking why, an officer explained “We are charging you with possession of drugs, but-”
“What????!!” we reacted in shock “Drugs?!!??”.
“This doesn’t make sense?” we questioned as this was outrageous.
The officer continued, “If we don’t find anything, we will drop the charges”.
As if that validated the situation. I asked “So we’re guilty until proven innocent”- to which I was ignored.
Again on this busy road with the police lights flashing, you can imagine the embarrassment and frustration as I was told to pull down my boxers as he began to search me. Whilst we were all out of the car, they began to search it.
After finding nothing illegal on any of the four individuals searched or in the car – you would assume that it would be something to the degree of ‘sorry for any inconvenience caused, enjoy the rest of your trip’. But nope, they decided to arrest the driver. On the grounds that “he looks like he is on drugs”.
My friend turned to us and explained “You see what I’ve been telling you, the police here always have an excuse to arrest us”. I later heard the account of several non-white Danes who had similar experiences of unjustified police action.
The police officer told him to shut up, as he was arrested, rather aggressively against the wall in handcuffs- despite him saying “I’m coming with you guys, is this necessary?”.
Brief summary of the events so far:
• we were stopped (for no legitimate reason)
• We were charged and invasively searched (based on a suspicion with no basis)
• One was arrested, sitting in handcuffs at the back of the police car, based on a thought- again with no basis
• All with a disrespectful tone and an arrogant demeanour
Now, they decided to search the boot of the car and they saw two suitcases, belonging to the two of us going to the airport to travel back to London. They began to search the suitcases. We asked them if they could be careful as it was a very tight squeeze to get everything packed the first time (hand luggage restrictions). Even several times explaining that if we had anything we shouldn’t have- we’d be caught by airport police. We asked if they wanted to see our boarding passes but instead they decided to search anyway, opening suitcases in a rather disorganised manner.
Now I was frustrated, but it seemed as though I had the ‘nicer’ officer- as the other one searching my friend’s bag was literally throwing his things out.
Despite our frustrations, there was nothing we could do. Pleading with them reasonably had no merit and I could imagine reacting to their seemingly provocative actions would have been worse.
Now after literally 40 seconds of messing up our luggage, they found nothing. It made the search seem completely pointless, even if I had something illegal in my bag, a quick 40 second mess around wouldn’t be sufficient to find it. All they did was ruin our tightly packed bags… but we move on.
It came to putting the things back, which to my surprise they did- Well, to the best of their ability.
The bag was no longer able to close, due to the disorganised way in which they were re-packed. The officer attempted for a few seconds and then said, “You have too much shit in there, you’ll have to do it when you get to the airport”. I felt powerless, frustrated and worried about my flight, but the worst thing was I wasn’t surprised by this, and I had no choice but to accept it.
Now we stood on the side of our road with unclosed suitcases, and one friend in the back of the police car.
The bullying seemed over, and we looked in time to catch our flight.
For some reason, the officer refused to hand the car key back to the car owner.
I’m not sure what excuse was given but they kept the keys.
While the car owner tried to plead with the officer- the other officer began almost jokingly telling us the bus route to the airport. This ordeal was finally over (for me) as I took the bus to the airport.
The police left with my friend in the back of their car, the officer said “enjoy your trip” with the most smug look on her face. For my friend, the ordeal continued for about an hour. He had a blood test and a urine test (both negative) at the station.
Fun fact: later that evening he was stopped by a separate set of police officers. He had to explain to them that he had literally just come from the police station and tested negative to everything.
I would never wish this experience on anyone. My frustration and feeling of helplessness came from the several dimensions to how wrong this is.
– The officers conduct was unprofessional and thug-like at best. At worst, it was racial profiling, an unlawful stop, an unlawful search, and an unlawful arrest.
– Their reasons for their actions weren’t even logical, and once they had realised their suspicions had no basis, they continued digging and digging as a desperate attempt to find something, ignoring the fact we had a flight to catch.
– The actions of the police has added to stereotypes and negative public perception of foreigners – while they strip searched us on the side of the road there were people passing by. Even though there were no grounds for the search the public just saw a group of non-white boys in trouble with the police.
– Furthermore, the experience has fuelled mine and my friend’s frustration and lack of trust at police officers, which would deter many from cooperating in the future.
What’s worse is that misconduct on behalf of police has become normalised- some of my friends in this Nordic country aren’t even fazed by it. This represents a much larger problem that this is not ‘just a few bad police officers’, but rather a deeper problem with; police training, police hiring and general racist pre-conceived opinions of this country’s people.
Despite this horrible experience, my friend and I managed to catch our flight. But I spent the last months still frustrated by what had happened, really tainting every positive thought I had about C. This was a perfect opportunity for self evaluation, ‘what could I have done better’. After considering my actions, and reading posts of others in ‘similar’ situations in Scandinavia, it seemed as though there was not much I could have done to help my situation.
I don’t just like wallowing in self pity, especially about things I can’t change. But simply not liking something doesn’t change the reality. I was down- and still am when anything triggers this memory. It’s not just about the experience itself, but the wider consequences – actually a world wide problem.
My feelings moved me to lodge a complaint through the independent complaints system.
After a month or so, I received a response, which said something to the degree of ‘this is a bigger issue than us to deal with, the police commissioner will contact you’. I was filled with a strange feeling of excitement? – That’s the wrong word but something to the degree of satisfaction as I anticipated justice.
A further few months had passed and I had a phone call from an unknown number.
It was the police commissioner.
A lot of back and forth but the main conclusions for this phone call are that:
• Basically, the police can do what they want.
• Police can speak to you how they like- as it demands respect or something.
• They are ‘well trained’ in a test (which looks at your eyes) and judges whether you are on drugs or not – and this test is apparently successful despite having no evidence of its accuracy – (and in my friends case it was clearly off).
• The commissioner couldn’t explain the rationale behind the assessment.
• Approximately 50 cars are stopped daily- for various reasons- but he couldn’t explain the reason why we were stopped.
• This country doesn’t have statistics on the frequencies of different ethnicities being stopped and searched, but claim ethnicity has no influence.
• Despite providing no rationale behind the police actions, or providing any evidence based explanation for their practise – he seemed to accept that they did the right thing and essentially this call was a formality – to tick a box.
• He did however say “he would speak to the officers about the way they spoke to us”.
Wohoo.
Unfortunately, this story doesn’t have a happy ending. As mentioned before, I don’t like just feeling sorry for myself. So I began planning strategies of how this can be avoided in the future. For example, putting public pressure on the police to record how often they treat innocent people like criminals – especially if invasive searching takes place – with these statistics uploaded to a database, updated in real time.
Maybe these ideas don’t have legs, and maybe they will come to nothing, but I find thinking about ways to make our world better kind of therapeutic. I just didn’t know that I could be going about my normal business and then experience something so upsetting from officers who are supposed to be there to protect. I asked at the outset, ‘What do the police stand for?’ But I now think the better question would be ‘Who do they stand for?’
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