The police in Brandenburg have been awarded with the Negative Prize, after various human rights violations among them their violent attempt to deport a pregnant Kenyan lady.
Wednesday, November 2nd. A Kenyan lady is walks into the Carl-Thiem Clinic in Cottbus accompanied by the police. The police had showed up unannounced at her door that morning and claiming they had been sent by the immigration office to accompany the lady to the clinic and find out if she was in a condition to travel in order for them to deport her to Kenya. All this was happening a day before her planned visit to the immigration office. Usually, the immigration office is required to inform you at least a month before the deportation date, which wasn’t the case here.
Ms. N. had already suffered two miscarriages and a stillbirth, her current pregnancy was also risky. She had been taken into psychological care to help her go through it. All this was known to the immigration office in Cottbus, but that did not stop them.
On getting to the hospital, Ms. N. got a panic attack and causing her severe abdominal pain. A nurse who had come to serve Ms. N completely ignored they cry for help and insisted that she could only do what the police officers had requested her to do, thus couldn’t go out of her way to look into Ms. N’s condition. Overwhelmed by the pain, Ms. N collapsed but even that couldn’t stop the police from taking her to the police station to prepare for the deportation.
Fortunately, a member of the FluMiCo (Flight and Migration in Cottbus), who was accompanying the lady to the clinic, was able to get a lawyer to stop the deportation with a warrant from the court.
Sadly, these kinds of deportation attempts are becoming quite a regular in Brandenburg. Another case involving the Immigration Office in Oranienburg, involved Ms. D who was handcuffed and her legs and hips tied with belts by five policemen in the middle of the night while still in her pyjamas. The lady that suffers from mental illness tried unsuccessfully to defend and free herself. She was taken to a holding cell at the Tegel Airport where she was bound in a body cuff and an inhalation mask was put on her face so she could not speak. When she refused to take medication a doctor was offering her, one of the heavy policemen sat on her causing internal bleeding in her abdomen. The police were finally able to get her onto the plane, but seeing her condition, the pilot refused to take her with him.
The deportation was put on hold but the lady has been in psychiatric care in a Brandenburg hospital since that night.
The police in Brandenburg have come under fire for these human rights violations with some of the organisations calling for the resignation of the police chief and the immigration office head.