LISBON
All eighteen police officers from a police station in Portugal have been indicted for torture, abduction, falsification of reports, and other allegedly racially motivated crimes. The case relates to the arrest of six black young people in 2015, said prosecutors Tuesday.
The police officers worked in a patrol unit in Alfragide, a village near Lisbon. They are accused of torture and other cruel, degrading and inhuman treatment, unlawful detention, serious abuse of powers and violation of their duties”.
The indictments are drawn up after a joint investigation of the prosecutors and the judicial police after complaints from the families of the six arrested young people. Racist violence is rare in the poorest country of Western Europe, which has less immigrants and refugees attracts than richer countries, such as Spain or France. But the country has large minorities with roots in its African ex-colonies, as well as in Brazil and India.