Images of the day he arrived in Spain often come back to Djack, but when he remembers it, this young Malian would prefer to go back and never have experienced it. I would have preferred to be sent back to Morocco like the other times. He would have preferred, he said, to stay in Mali despite the war. Because as soon as he set foot on Spanish soil, a civil guard, he said, hit him so hard in the face that he was left blinded in one eye forever.
The young Malian reported the episode a year ago, which occurred on March 2, 2022, in a court in Melilla and this Monday he sits down for the first time to testify by video call before the judge in charge of the case, legally . supported by the Irídia-Centro for the Defense of Human Rights. This is the first procedure ordered by the magistrate in more than a year and a half of investigation and it comes after the court tried to close the case with practically no action. Following a judgment from the Provincial Court, which required its reopening for lack of sufficient investigation, Djack will be able to give his version of events. The Malian will be heard.
“Reporting what happened to me is my right and I must do it. I want the truth to be known,” says the Malian in a video call interview with elDiario.es. “I don’t understand why they had to do this to me. “They could have sent me back to Morocco and nothing happened,” adds the young man, already a legal resident in Spain after the government responded positively to his asylum request. Djack denounced the agent who hit him as well as his superior on the ground for a possible crime of torture and injury, with the aggravating factors of racism and prevalence of public nature.
The facts
Early on March 2, 2022, several hundred people jumped over the fence in Melilla. Among them was Djack who, accompanied by a friend, managed to jump over the fence. Already on Spanish soil, while they were trying to flee and move away from the border, a Civil Guard agent grabbed his partner by the clothes “with his left hand”, while with his right hand he held a baton, details the complaint.
At that moment, Djack ran in front of the right side of the agent, who tried to stop him, again according to his account: “The agent did not have the strength to catch the two. And he hit me twice: once in the eyes and once in the back,” the boy recalls. “I started running to avoid being sent back to Morocco. My left eye was bleeding a lot. I had trouble opening the other one because they used pepper spray on us as well. I barely saw either of them. And someone helped me get to the CETI Temporary Stay Center for Immigrants in Melilla.
From there he was transferred to the hospital, where he remained hospitalized for 15 days. “In the hospital, I always asked, ‘Is this eye going to see again or not?’ And no one told me the truth. They told me: ‘calm down’ and nothing more, “recalls Djack. He had just immigrated to Spain. he didn’t know the language and he felt alone and afraid “There I suffered a lot because I was in great pain, I was alone, I didn’t understand the language, I didn’t know what was going to happen to me. arrive…”
When he came out, the pain didn’t stop. “I always had a lot of pain. In the center, my head and eyes hurt a lot. Always, always. I had a very bad time”, describes the young man. At that time, when he was a minor, he was placed for a while in a juvenile facility, until the test to determine the age concluded that he was over 18, while his birth certificate indicated that he was 17. He was then housed at the Temporary Stay Center for Immigrants of Melilla (CETI) where he entered into contact with the Spanish Commission for Assistance to Refugees (CEAR), which helped him in his asylum procedure. Thanks to the NGO, he was finally transferred to Barcelona and there he began to be treated in a. specialized center.
“When I arrived at the hospital in Barcelona, they told me my eye was missing. Whom I was never going to see again,” says the Malian. Then he collapsed. “I didn’t want to live. I didn’t understand why this happened to me. I didn’t know a life like that, I was afraid of knowing how I was going to move forward. I started to think that I wanted to die,” explains the boy. “If I had known that this was going to happen to me, I would not have left Mali. There is war there and my life was in danger, but knowing they were going to do this to me, it wasn’t worth it.
Although he feels better and has gradually regained the desire to move forward, his psychological consequences persist after the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder and major depressive disorder. In addition to continuing to benefit from the psychological support provided by CEAR-Cataluña, he receives psychiatric treatment, with pharmacological treatment and follow-up sessions, through the Transcultural Psychiatry Program of the Vall d’Hebron Hospital in Barcelona, explains his lawyer.
“For a long time I couldn’t sleep. I had nightmares about what happened. And when I saw a policeman, everything that had happened came to mind. These memories… I couldn’t get them out of my head and I was always tired,” describes Djack. “They had to give me pills because I was tossing and turning all the time and I couldn’t rest.”
This blow to the Melilla fence affected his life. “It affected me in every way. It’s like another life. I wanted to devote myself to basketball. I’m very tall and it was my passion. I have always been very sporty. But I will no longer be able to do it professionally,” laments the Malian on the other side of the computer. “Even taking the metro sometimes puts me in trouble. People look me in the eyes. I notice how they look at me, like I’m a criminal. I don’t like it, I’m ashamed,” complains the twenty-year-old.
After arriving in Spain, Djack requested asylum due to the conflict in his home country, Mali. The Ministry of the Interior accepted his request and recognized his subsidiary protection, so he already resides in Spain. The government’s decision in his case highlights the difficulties faced by refugees like Djack, young people who are entitled to asylum due to the situation in their country but who cannot seek protection other than by risking their lives. life, whether by crossing the fence or at sea, as is also currently the case for many Malians who take the Canary Islands route.
When he was a child, Djack and his family had to flee their town due to the violent situation in which the town was plunged. After suffering several attacks, they left for another part of the country but, after settling down and rebuilding their lives, on March 24, 2019, a terrorist attack took place in the city in which at least 160 people were killed. murdered. Among them was Djack’s mother. On February 2, 2020, the Malian decided to flee, according to the complaint. After leaving Mali, he attempted to seek asylum in Algeria, without success, and eventually spent time in Morocco, where he suffered episodes of persecution and police violence, until he decided to attempt to enter Spanish territory to request asylum, according to Iridia.
Today, the young man works as a cook in Barcelona. He can practice the profession learned during his years in Spain, even if he faces difficulties linked to his disability, officially recognized by the Administration. “Sometimes complications arise, like when someone approaches me from a side I can’t see, but I manage to get the job done,” says Djack.
In anticipation of Monday’s statement, he says he is somewhat nervous, but he is prepared and impatient because, he repeats again and again, “the truth must be known.”
“It is very important that what happened to me is investigated. Because it seems like black people have no rights. People must know that I have the right, that they cannot do what they did to me,” declares the young man, helped by his lawyer who accompanies him at all times during the interview. “I also reported it because I don’t want what happened to me to happen to anyone else.”
