Justice blinded and silenced by system corruption (Wong Zi Yuet)
Since last year, police brutality has been harming thousands of people. The wounds may scab over, but the psychological shadow and mental stress will remain for the rest of one’s life.
In November last year, the police laid siege to the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Residents of the city swarming across Yau Tsim Mong District to express support for the students and protesters were once again dispersed and arrested. Since I was one of them, the memories of the scene of the crackdown, which can be literally depicted as “a field littered with corpses”, are still vivid. A lot of people with blood streaming down their cheeks were denied help from paramedics, a ride to hospital, and even a sip of water. They were deprived of basic human rights with just a few words from the police: “They are criminals”! I still remember another arrestee on my side with blood oozing from the wounds on his swollen face was sent directly to a police station instead of hospital. What a ghastly sight! Yet, when I made eye contact with him, I was literally overwhelmed with brotherly affection in his gentle smile, which confided in me with words alike, “I’m fine. You stay safe.” To my surprise at the moment, manifestation of resolution is gentleness.
I was arrested before dawn. When I was settled in the police station, morning had broken. Despite being aware that my friends had been calling for lawyers for me, I was still fidgety when seeing some other arrestees meet with their counselors and some chew the food sent by their families, and being told by the officers that no lawyers had come to see me. Before long, I suffered from abstinence reactions because I had not taken medicine for too long. I was then sent to hospital where I finally chanced upon my family. When I was told that most lawyers in town were occupied with other arrestees, so too busy to see me, the all the way repressed fear of being charged for rioting forthwith was rising before my mind. After returning to the police station from hospital the next day, without a glimpse of my lawyer, I was informed of an immediate trial, which took me aback with the menacing fact that
I was to be put on trial without a defense counselor. It was such a weight off my mind when my lawyer finally arrived in time. Bailed out, I learnt that about two thousand people had been arrested in the past two days.
Among all the arrestees, I was the only exception that I could not get in touch with a lawyer. Even though I knew the police did it out of spite, the feeling of loneliness and being forgotten was even more substantial and predominant over all of my concerns. For this reason, every time I am told comrades in custody or in a plight are forgotten by the external world and threatened by the authoritarian, I feel extraordinarily resentful. The authoritarian regime always aims at the feeble part of human nature by attacking protesters’ friends and relatives, intimidating and depriving them of their livelihood. The persecution will only get worse until all dissent is rooted out.
Though I was not injured in the event, I clearly remember one of the police officers sized me up before sneering at the color of my nipples when I was getting ready for getting on a tourist bus. That was not the last time I was sexually harassed by the police. On Mother’s Day this year, police officers also depicted and commented on my breasts and figure when I was stopped and searched for allegedly violating “prohibited group gathering”.
On that day, my friend and I were manhandled and dragged from crowds into the cordoned zone by the police, and were issued tickets with no reasons at all. When we were undergoing body search, we were asked to unlock our phones, which were deemed stolen on no grounds by the police officers who were obviously abusing their power. Privacy is no longer exclusive and safeguarded, and Hong Kong people are not protected by the laws henceforth, not to mention basic human rights.
Appeals and independent inquiry used to be the ways out for victims, whereas for now, those reporting to the police are even wanted by the later. When justice is blinded and silenced by the corrupt system, the request for disbanding the police is fathomable. When the system is amoral, which is founded on the fact that law makers and enforcers are partial to the regime that strips cilvillians of the rights of appeal, a thorough reform is the only resolution.
(Wong Zi Yuet, protester)
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