“There is no explanation why the police use physical force in this situation. There is no professional reason to use physical force and the aids they have at their disposal in this way“. This was commented on bTV by Milen Ivanov, former deputy rector of the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Regarding the standards by which Bulgarian police officers are trained, he explained that they go through all the necessary training in stages.
“The way in which this is done is inadequate to the modern situation. You cannot become a police officer in a classroom while being lectured to. You have to work outside, in the field, solve situational tasks during your initial training“, Milen Ivanov noted.
“Here we clearly saw that the two police officers failed to assess the situation correctly. It is strange to me because they have been in the police for 4-5 years and must immediately recognize when a person is under the influence of some substances or has psychiatric problems. This is everyday life for police officers, but this is not included in their training“, he pointed out.
According to him, there is a very serious problem in the Ministry of Internal Affairs - the lack of institutional memory.
“Years ago, after the "Trupkov" case, video surveillance was introduced in all "Traffic Police" and patrol cars - in the same way that body cameras were introduced, without regulating the way they function and the attitude of police officers towards them. We currently have body cameras, but we do not have a regulation on how they are used“, Milen Ivanov specified and added that police officers are obliged to wear them.
“From there, the problems begin. The body cameras are large, there is nowhere to hang them so that they do not get in the way. They have to work constantly, the batteries do not last, there are no spare batteries“, the expert commented and asked who watches the video files from the body cameras.
Milen Ivanov emphasized that there is a lack of real situational preparation – everyone should open a car, put on handcuffs, put on handcuffs when resisting, as well as in the selection of people who want to become police officers.