Former Budapest police chief Péter Gergényi will appear in court on June 30 for the first time in the case against him for misuse of power and wrongful dismissal. The Budapest Military Prosecutor’s Office recently pressed charges against Gergényi on six counts and another former police leader on one count. According to the penal code, misuse of power can result in up to two years is prison.
Gergényi was reported by Péter Rónyai, a police officer, who was dismissed illegally, and, despite a labor court decision, was not re-engaged for six months. The same also happened to seven other policemen. The case of all eight officers will be heard together, reports fn.hu.
So, let me get this straight, Gergenyi is in trouble for labor law violations, and not for gross violations of human rights? Fuck me…
Hatodik Oszlop if you have any proof for “gross violations of human rights”, why not present them? Or take Gergényi to court directly?
I’m guessing you’ve never heard of YouTube then. Gergenyi was the man in charge of the police on October 23, 2006, and as their chief, he is responsible for their actions.
I know some of the guys who edited those YouTube-clips heavily for political motives.
YouTube is not proof. Original and un-edited films are.
There were some excessive violence from the individual Police Officers and that of cource the whole chain of command is responsible for. That is though far away from “gross violations of human rights”.
I’ll concede that perhaps the term “gross” is being hyperbolic, nonetheless, the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union and the Helsinki Federation for Human Rights weren’t being critical because they were bored.
And of course the videos on YouTube are edited. I doubt that awful heavy metal music was being played all over central Budapest that day. Nonetheless, you can’t edit the videos to show the police being brutal if they were never brutal to begin with.
Part of the problem during the riots October 23, 2006, was the Hungarian Law that forced the Police to break up un-annonced demonstrations. This law, as it was written in 2002 under the Fidesz Government, has been declared bad by the European Court of Justice recently. That is why a new law is being drafted that will allow un-annonced demos, like “flashmobs”, with certain restrictions.
The actual change of scenario 23/10-06, could have lead to the Police taking a lower profile to non-violent demonstrators, just directing them out of the way of traffic. As it stood, and stands still today, the Police *must* stop and break up even a peaceful demonstrations.
Less confrontation between Police and demonstrators means less risk for bad behaviour, like we are seeing today from the Philadelphia Police in the US.
Part of the problem on October 23, 2006, is that the rioters wanted to meet up with the peaceful Fidesz rally, and the police were all to happy to let that happen, which is when things truly got out of control.
Hatodik Oszlop wrote: “rioters wanted to meet up with the peaceful Fidesz rally, and the police were all to happy to let that happen”
If you checked the papers a few week before October 23rd, 2006, you will find several articles about criticism against Fidesz and warnings from the Police that the venue chosen by Fidesz for their meeting created a lot of problems for the Police. It was obviously also discussions inside the Police to ban the meeting at that specific spot. Now did this not happen, with know result.
I remember my wife complaining to me on October 23 around lunch time, that the Police stopped people from marching from Deak Ter, so the Police tried, but what should they have done? Stopped all traffic? How do you differ a “rioter” from a “peaceful demonstrator”, when he is not rioting?
As I written many times, the Hungarian Police tactic was, and still seems to be very oriented towards relying on hard to move water-canons, which needs 100s of Police Officers and lots of teargas around them to protect them. It makes for a very rigid tactical structure and basically makes it impossible to fast adjust to the ever-changing situation on the ground. Here one should look at the UK Police Forces experiences in handling riots in Northern Ireland, which have been implemented by the Danish Police and also is being implemented by the Swedes.
Of course normal demonstrators got beaten up, when they did not adhere to direct orders and some were beaten up anyway. EndOfChar