General Prosecutor General Jaromír Čižnár criticised the work of two Nitra district prosecutors in the case of neo-Nazis allegedly attacking patron of the Mariatchi Bar in Nitra. They opted to release five suspects detained in this connection.
Police are dealing with two incidents involving the bar, its customers and its owner. The first incident dates back to October 5, when five suspected neo-Nazis are alleged to have assaulted the pub’s customers, some of whom sustained serious injuries. The second incident, on January 1, involved an attack against the pub’s owner, who ended up with a broken leg. The alleged perpetrators of the first attack were taken into custody last week, only to be released by Nitra District Prosecutor a day and a half later. The alleged attackers in the second case have never even been taken into custody.
The first Nitra district prosecutor argued she found no reason to keep suspects in custody. Čižnár said as quoted by the Sme daily, as she had never truly examined the background of the case.
The second district prosecutor, who released them after the suspects had been held for two days, saw the video proving their attack on the customers of Mariatchi Bar only after it was published by Sme, but freed them nevertheless. Čižnár said that three of the attackers already had criminal record of beating and kicking people. He has taken the case from the Nitra prosecutors to the General Prosecutor’s Office in Bratislava and sent an inspection to Nitra. (The inspection is to check whether there are any more similar cases in Nitra, the SITA newswire wrote.)
The general prosecutor also asked for the Regional Prosecutor Vojtech Ernest to rule on disciplinary measures against the two prosecutors, the TASR newswire wrote.
Čižnár reported on the case before the Constitutional-Legal Committee of parliament on February 4. Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák and Police President Tibor Gašpar also spoke before the committee, defending the police procedure: it took police four months to come up charges and give the case to prosecutor, one day after Sme published a story on the case with a video recording of the attack. Kaliňák argued that police wanted to investigate the case properly and find evidence so that the sentences can be tougher. Nevertheless, he and Gašpar also send an inspection team to Nitra.
(Source: Sme, SITA, TASR)
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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