Police action in the camps? Lawyers' Bastion defends inquiry

O bastonário da Ordem dos Advogados defended today the need to carry out an inquiry into the performance of security forces in the camps in Lisbon and Porto, as “only way” to ascertain the truth of the facts.

In statements to the agency Lusa, João Massano said that, although he was not aware of “sufficient of what really happened, in addition to what is reported by the media,” he considered “essential and necessary to be measured what really happened and whether or not there were limits in police intervention and effectively what happened to protesters.”.

In this context, he also recalled that, “in a rule of law, we cannot accept lawyers standing outside a police station” and that “those who need legal protection, stay inside”.

For the president of the Bar Association, “either the right to demonstrate, or the right to guarantee and the obligation to guarantee public order are fundamental and it is really necessary to know what happened,” he stressed, adding that “it is only possible with an inquiry”.

An inquiry to be carried out by the Internal Administration Inspector General (IAI) and that the bastonary hopes that “he can really determine whether or not there has been a breach of the limits, including police intervention.”.

“ I think the police themselves are interested in this and have of course interest (...) that everything is cleared up and effectively clarified so that there are no doubts about what was done ", he observed.

Noting that there is knowledge that “sometimes there are situations that should be limited and in fact there are sometimes excesses,” João Massano maintained that everything depends on what “actually happened”.

“ And that we will only know with an inquiry, because we saw the police talking to the protesters, asking them to back off and unfortunately could not do it”, he said.

The president of the Bar Association also argued that “we all have to be very calm now” and “not enter into a narrative of politicization of this situation”.

For João Massano, it was “the worst that can happen,” he stressed, adding that we all know that “we have the right to manifest ourselves, but everything has limits”.

“ I don’t want to, nor should I be defending the police, what I think is that right now we are living in a situation where we tend to see only one side and we know that there are situations where what seems not very real and there may have been something that happened that may have caused a certain situation,” he said.

We must be “very careful, because the right to demonstrate is important but we also need the security forces to ensure that everything is normal” although we do not “want, of course, that the limits are exceeded”, he stressed.

João Massano also admitted that some of the images transmitted by the media “without framework or knowledge that something may have led” to the reaction of some police “it seems to have been disproportionate” in the actions of security forces.

For a better understanding of the truth of the facts, the bastonist defended the use of body cams by security forces.

If they used them “it was easier” and it was the “effective” way of discovering the truth of the facts in these situations, they sustained.

Even for what happened in the Rato police station, João Massano was still concerned about “conditions of detention in the police stations and the follow-up by lawyers”, which concerns the Order beyond this situation that the country goes through.

João Massano also admitted to having received reports of detainees in the camps to whom the security forces had said that it was not necessary to be accompanied by lawyers in the trip to the police stations.

“ There have been some situations that have been reported to me and I will naturally have to ask the competent authorities to investigate, and which in fact make me more convinced of the need for close monitoring in the precincts by lawyer and defense of the rights of lawyers to accompany their clients and detainees,” he stressed, adding that this is “another reason” to ascertain the truth of the facts.

“I’m not saying that it happened or that it stopped happening, but it was important to know if it happened and if something happened in the police station of Rua da Palma that could have gone better than what happened,” he stressed.

“ If there is one thing that we, of course, in a rule of law, cannot accept is that lawyers stand outside a police station and that their clients, or at least those who need legal protection, stay inside,” he concluded.