2019-08-14

Gaza

Gaza

His Excellency Attorney General, Diaa Al-Deen Al-Madhoun, / Gaza,

Subject: Invasion of Privacy and Overstepping the Police Powers' Limits Violate Law Provisions and Require Accountability

MUSAWA- The Palestinian Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession extends its warmest greetings to your Excellency, noting that the center received a written complaint from Faten Al-Safi, resident at Al-Zahra City in Gaza, in which she stated that in the early morning of 19/6/2019, a number of Abu-Ureiban Police Center’s officers raided her house on the instructions of the Patrol Officer …………, and mentioned that three police officers pointed their weapons at her and her children, which terrified them, while other police officers embarked on breaking down the front door with hammers, as they insisted on searching the house to find her husband, who was at his brother’s house back then, on the floor above the complainant’s house.

In her complaint, the complainant added that the police officers threatened her to arrest one of her children if she prevented them from searching her house looking for her husband, even though she promised to accompany her husband to the police station once he comes back home.

Then complainant mentioned that the invasion was in response for a complaint filed by a creditor against her husband, not in the implementation of a judicial ruling, given that he is a wounded former prisoner, who provides for his family and his crippled mom. The complainant stated that the Police Officers refused her request to take her husband to the police station, out of deference to his health condition and to avoid having him arrested before his children and the neighbors, and chased him house to his brother’s house, during which he fell from the fourth floor and got severely injured before the sight of the police officers, who did not bother themselves to call the ambulance, but rather mocked him. In her turn, the complainant filed a complaint against the Patrol Officer and that she is under pressure to withdraw her complaint.

MUSAWA believes that this complaint entails that Police overstep their powers and a refrain from implementing their job duties, including obtaining search warrants, implementing the inspection procedure in a manner that preserved the citizens’ dignity, and avoiding actions that could violate privacy and access to the judiciary.

Thus, MUSAWA demands your Excellency to take the needed legal action concerning this memo, to account the Patrol Officer and the police members, and to ensure the complainant’s right of compensation duly. Hoping that you keep us updated with the action taken by your side.

With All Due Respect,

Issued on 1/8/2019

MUSAWA

Attachments:

A copy of the complaint