Policing in Brief; Spain: Reparation withdrawn:
01 March 2003
A protestor who was seriously injured by a gas canister fired by police during a demonstration in Pamplona (Navarra) saw the Supreme Court revoke an order by the Audiencia Nacional for the interior ministry to pay 10 million Ptas. damages to Mikel Iribarren Pinillos. The Supreme Court disagreed with the previous ruling that the police "acted in a disproportionate manner", arguing that the plaintiff participated in an illegal demonstration during which violence occurred, seriously disturbing public order. Thus, the riot squad's intervention was not deemed "disproportionate", and the injury was not shown to have been caused deliberately, but by chance. One of the judges disagreed, stating that he did not feel that the plaintiff had "the legal duty" to accept having to "put up with the impact of a gas container in the head, fired by the security forces at a very short distance". El País 1.3.03.