The Obiora case. A dark spot on Norway's "clean sheet"

[Kargool]

6th September 2006 an incident that will have repercussions for the Norwegian police for years happened. Eugene Obiora, a man from Nigera was choked to death by the Norwegian police outside the social office where he was denied so called emergency help. A more detailed recall of the incident can be found here.

Obioras only fault was to be a man in a desperate situation. What does this tell about the current justice system in Norway a few people complained, and then the case started to roll.

A named police officer was involved in the killing of Obiora and he had an earlier case of excessive use of violence against him. He had previously gone to a bank when an alarm at the bank had gone of at night, and he attacked a member of the cleaning staff who was in the bank cleaning and accidentally triggered an alarm. She was also black, and the same policeguy severely beat her up.

Now, you would think that this would be used against him seeing as this was a very similar case, but no, the internal affairs board (who all consists of ex cops or lawyers who have worked in the police) was told to disregard that as the two happenings although similar had no relevancy (shock gasp).

So what happens?

Well, first there was a lone blog that stood up against this totally insane situation, then more followed, and then some, which has resulted in demonstrations in 4 of norways biggest cities, allthough peaceful, the clear shout from the masses is that the people responsible for killing Obiora should be dismissed from the police.

Next that happened was that a Norwegian ska/rap band called Samvirkelaget made a song called Stopp Volden (stop the violence) Volden was also the name of the policeman in question. He and the policemen's union thought that it was a low blow and was against it being played. They filed a lawsuit for slander against Samvirkelaget but however it got dismissed in court. The band however stopped using his name directly, but when a song is called Stop Volden and Volden is your surname I can only assume that this feels kind of annoying. However I just love the fact that this bastard is being held accountable for his own actions.

So, now we got a lot of people with no respect at all for the police, and jury members who have openly expressed that in the future they will see policemen with a more prying eye than before.

People have lost confidence in the polices ability to keep the streets safe, and when the police go to actions like choking a desperate man to death, when they were 4 policemen who could easily have talked their way out of it decided to use violence instead of talks, the usually peaceful Norwegian starts an uproar.

Me personally have attended all demonstrations with great interest and vigor, the demonstrations have started in the center of the city, and then moved down to the police station. I have witnessed 1600 peaceful demonstrants go to the police station and generally verbally abuse the policemen who has lined up outside the police station to appear to be listening to what we are saying.

Now, the first demo I attended i actually walked over to the head of the police in Trondheim and said my piece, in front of a few other youths. I told him who i was, and why i was protesting.

Now, while others have been shouting racism on the top of their lungs, I have been rather quietly thinking that this could have happened to anyone. So my question to the policechief was simply: How can you allow that your men decides to use excessive violence instead of actually trying to talk to the man? There was numerous witnesses to the killing and everyone pretty much tells the same story, that the police just walked straight over to him, and tried to put him on the ground, without any talks and without any provocation from the man's side, of course when it happened he fought back, he was from Nigeria, a place where if you get arrested by the police, chances are you don't come back.

The totally senseless use of police violence is what provoked me most in this case, and I will keep turning up on demonstrations to add my voice of discontent to the others who feel the same.

To add to this, the police has of course now banned this choke hold maneuver from being learned and from being used. (But they still refuse to say that the policemen did anything wrong)

I guess Norway simply isn't as nice a place as we thought.