On January 12, citizens begin an unplanned gathering near the restaurant Babilo. The reason for the protest is a corporate party for judges. The event is also attended by the judges who are presiding over the trials of citizens arrested during the violently dispersed demonstration. Among those near the restaurant is Nutsa Makharadze, who will be arrested within a few hours and then asked to completely undress under the pretext of “examination” at the Dighomi detention center.
Nutsa is one of the people who have had a similar experience. In this article, we will learn about the stories of those people who tell of inappropriate, inhumane, and degrading treatment by law enforcement officers, in particular, forced undressing, and together with a lawyer, we will discuss the legality of this practice.
“This is a feeling and treatment that you know you don’t deserve.”
Nutsa Makharadze arrived at the Babilo restaurant on January 12 at 7:00 PM. She says that before being arrested, she was standing in front of the restaurant, neither blocking the road nor having any kind of communication with the police. The argument began when one of the law enforcement officers approached her friend.
“[My friend] had her foot on the stairs leading up to Babilo, and he said, ‘Why is your foot here?’ My friend replied, ‘What do mean?’ During this argument, I got up, left where I was standing, and simply asked, ‘Why are you talking to my friend like that?’ He said, ‘What do you mean why I am talking to her like this? Get out of here,’ he told us. He pushed me and my friend and this is how my arrest began,” Nutsa tells us.
Citizen arrested near the Babilos restaurant / IPN
She recalls that during her arrest, about 10-15 police officers surrounded her, dragged her by hair, and led her to the bus stop, holding her limbs. At some point, she lost consciousness.
“It didn’t last long, but the road from the restaurant to the bus stop was quite a bit, and they dragged me there.”
A short time later, several arrested boys were brought in the same car: “I was in shock, I had passed out and now I was awake, I didn’t know what was happening to me. I couldn’t speak for a few minutes. These boys were telling the policemen: ‘What are you doing, what did you do, how did you treat the woman?’ One policeman told these boys that I had hit a policeman and shouldn’t they have arrested me?! I was able to react to this by telling him that he was lying and that he should show the dashcam footage.”
Nutsa, along with other detainees, was first taken to the main building of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and then to the Dighomi detention center. Before the placement procedure began, one of the citizens detained with her warned her that they would do a strip search.
Nutsa Makharadze / FB
“It was very unexpected for me, because I had never heard of it before. It was my first encounter with something like this, with the police, with a police station. I was upset, but this guy told me that it was better to get used to it emotionally before they took you inside, because it would definitely happen — they would definitely strip you, and even if you resisted, it would still happen, and it was better for you to prepare yourself internally. That’s how my brain started preparing,” Nutsa tells us.
After taking fingerprints, taking photos, and confiscating her belongings, Nutsa was taken to a small room where a female and male police officer questioned her. Then, only a female law enforcement officer and a doctor remained in the room, who told her to undress. According to Nutsa, the law enforcement officers had not prepared her in advance that they would strip her naked, and she was faced with the fact. In addition, they did not explain to her the legal basis for the request.
“Somehow I still hoped that it might not be complete nudity, because it’s one thing when you’re left with nothing but your underwear in front of strangers, it’s embarrassing and very humiliating, etc. But complete nudity is something else. Underwear doesn’t determine anything, but complete nudity is another statement and a different kind of treatment. They asked me to completely undress, I didn’t object verbally, why were they doing this, because my brain was fully prepared that they would make me do it anyway, and I was exhausted, shocked, confused, etc. I didn’t have the courage to start a conversation anyway.”
Despite the fact that Nutsa was warned in advance by her fellow citizens, facing the fact was not emotionally easy for her. She evaluates this episode as humiliating and insulting.
“You don’t even know what it is in advance, because it’s the first time, and when you stand naked in front of two strange women, whoever they are, it’s very humiliating, offensive. It’s a misunderstanding, a very big misunderstanding, in which you don’t understand at that moment why you are there, what for, and ultimately, no innocent person can be ready for this. No matter how much we say and tell stories, and it’s good that we tell stories, no innocent person can be ready for this. Because this is a feeling and this is treatment that you know exactly that you don’t deserve and you still can’t understand why they’re treating you like this.
We have heard about forms of arrest and being found in solitary confinement, etc. But an innocent person fighting for the truth is not ready for this. To top it all, of course, the strip search — the humiliation, that you represent nothing, that you have to do whatever they tell you.”
“They tied my hands, wrestled me, and stripped me completely naked”
The leader of the opposition party, Droa, Elene Khoshtaria, is among those who were forced to strip. She was arrested at a rally near the parliament on March 28. In a letter sent the next day from the Dighomi temporary detention center, the oppositionist wrote about police violence, degrading treatment, and forced stripping.
Formula
Khoshtaria wrote in the letter that after she refused to cooperate with the department, police officers Nino Chkhartishvili and Davit Bolotashvili handcuffed her tightly behind her back and injured his jaw and teeth.
“An even more insulting episode occurred in Dighomi, in the temporary detention center, where, again against my will, my hands were tied behind my back by a brigade called from the police. I was held by two police officers (Nino Chkhartishvili, Salome Lashkhia and one more) who wrestled me and completely stripped me. This practice of forced stripping is a shameful, Russian method of violating human dignity and inflicting physical violence on them.”
Khoshtaria’s letter was followed by a statement from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where the agency wrote that “based on security norms, the necessary procedures were carried out for the detainee before being placed in a temporary detention center in full compliance with the legislation.” In the same statement, the agency did not directly confirm the fact of undressing and wrote that Khoshtaria refused to undergo the procedure. According to their own claims, an illegal substance was found on Khoshtaria, which is subject to an examination.
A noteworthy part of this statement is where the Ministry of Internal Affairs noted that the procedures for placing Khoshtaria in the detention center were recorded on video surveillance cameras. The agency expressed its readiness to provide relevant authorities and human rights defenders with the opportunity to review them, in accordance with the procedure established by law and with the consent of the detainee.
In response to this statement, Khoshtaria wrote that the Georgian Dream party was not satisfied with the violence and humiliating treatment it received from the police and was now pushing for the release of the footage. The oppositionist wrote:
“Now they’ve got propaganda channels mixed up with me, they’re going to put me on the back burner, and why don’t you demand the release of the footage? In other words, I should demand the release of the footage of my forced and violent nudity. In other words, if I didn’t have it, now I still have to watch the world. You’ve thought it through.”
“During the search, they told me to take off all my clothes”
Activist and founder of the Facebook group “Daitove” Nancy Woland is another woman who spoke out about the vicious practice of stripping from her own experience. Nancy’s case is different in that she was asked to strip not in a detention center, but in her home, during a search. Nancy describes the incident as psychological abuse.
Nancy Woland / FB
“At first, two female police officers came to my house and conducted a personal inspection, and the first psychological violence against me was when they told me to take off all my clothes. Yes, I have been to a doctor, but when the injustice of the system makes you undress, it is very embarrassing and everything burns from the injustice.”
Former Public Defender Nino Lomjaria responded to Nancy Woland’s post. She noted that she criticized the practice of nudity during her time as Ombudsman and highlighted it in her reports, but the state did not respond to this.
“They completely stripped me naked twice during a personal inspection”
Luka Kintsurashvili was arrested on March 31 on Vazha-Pshavela Avenue. The police searched his bag and demanded access to his Telegram chat on his phone. Luka refused to be searched, and before granting access to his mobile phone, he contacted a social justice lawyer for consultation. The lawyer asked the police to explain the legal basis and procedure for requesting a search of Luka’s personal phone. He also told them that he would be on site shortly so that the police could conduct any police activity with his participation, and advised Luka to turn on Facebook Live before his arrival. After that, the police confiscated Luka’s phone and administratively detained him.
According to the lawyer, after his arrest, he was forced to undress twice, once at the Vake-Saburtalo police station, and the second time while being held in a pre-trial detention center.
Publika
According to the Social Justice Center, during Luka’s arrest, his other constitutionally protected rights were also restricted. In particular, after the arrest, Kintsurashvili was not given the opportunity to contact his family and lawyer. Accordingly, Luka’s whereabouts were unknown to them for 6 hours after the arrest. The organization believes that this case is another clear confirmation that arbitrariness and inhuman treatment of detainees by the police have already become a normalized practice.
“I didn’t know that it was illegal”
Although cases of nudity have been actively revealed during the recent continuous wave of protests, a citizen detained during the 2023 protests also wrote about such experiences. Nadim Khmaladze was detained during the protests known as the March rallies, which followed a repressive Russian law that restricted the media and was initiated in parliament by the Georgian Dream.
“There’s no shame in speaking about it! I didn’t know it was illegal. They stripped me naked when I was arrested at the March protests!” Khmaladze wrote.
Picture from the March 2023 protests / Civil.ge
Nadim Khmaladze is not the only one who has questions about the legality/illegality of this procedure. It is important to know what local legislation says about this; what the international standard is; whether a citizen has the right to refuse the procedure; under what circumstances should the inspection take place, etc.
According to the Public Defender, during a full search by law enforcement officers, one should not be required to undress different parts of the body at the same time, and such a practice amounts to degrading and humiliating treatment.
In addition, Article 5 of the Internal Regulations of the Temporary Detention Centers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia stipulates that during personal searches, it is not permissible to completely undress the person being searched. The Ombudsman points out that such treatment is particularly concerning for women.
This order was issued by the Minister of Internal Affairs on August 2, 2016 and regulates the procedure for placing a person in the temporary detention center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. According to the Center for Social Justice, the practice of forced undressing contradicts this order, in accordance with which:
“A personal search is carried out immediately after the person to be placed in the isolation ward, in a separate place by a person of the same sex, away from the line of sight of others, in a room where there is no video surveillance camera. A person of the same sex may be present during the personal search. During the personal search of the person to be placed, his or her clothing is inspected and checked by an authorized guard of the isolation ward. After the personal search is completed, a report is drawn up, in which the clothing of the person to be searched is noted with the relevant characteristics. Various technical means may be used during the personal search.”
The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) considers that personal searches are often intrusive and may, even in the absence of such intent, amount to inhuman or degrading treatment if not carried out in a proper manner. It is essential, however, that treatment during searches be humane and not infringe on the inherent dignity of the person.
According to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, stripping a person naked during a search without appropriate grounds is inadmissible. If this is done inappropriately or without reason (for example, there is no threat or investigative value to conduct such a search), it will amount to ill-treatment or, in some cases, torture. As for searches, stripping is permissible only when it is impossible to achieve the goal by other means of examination. The question arises as to why citizens involved in the protest became targets of such treatment.
According to the Social Justice Center, the continued practice of forced stripping by the police is part of the state’s repressive policy, which it uses against citizens detained at protests.
The organization says that degrading and inhumane treatment of activists is encouraged by those agencies, including the Special Investigation Service, which have not yet investigated cases of torture and inhumane treatment of people detained at the rally by law enforcement officers.
“It is particularly worrying that the practice of violence, sexual harassment and degrading treatment against both detainees and women participating in gatherings in general has increased in law enforcement agencies. This once again indicates that today, the police system is completely disconnected from the goals of the rule of law, public order and protection of human rights and has become a repressive and punitive apparatus that serves the interests of the political regime.”
“It’s a way to show power of the state”
Mariam Kvelashvili, a lawyer at the Center for Social Justice, explained to Aprili Media that international standards allow for the stripping of a person, however, there are several factual circumstances that need to be taken into account. In particular, stripping should not be complete, but only the appropriate parts of the body. The procedure should be carried out in the presence of a person of the same sex. The procedure should only begin after its urgent necessity is identified.
In addition, Mariam emphasizes that there are appropriate special detectors, devices that can easily determine whether a person has a prohibited item on or inside their body.
“In many cases, this exposure does not serve the circumstances at all for these items to be discovered and is actually a demonstration by the state that it has a certain amount of power and can, very easily, bypass the law and use this power.”
Mariam emphasizes that it is necessary, both during an arrest and a search, to explain to the citizen the legal basis for the request. In the case of a search, there must be a court ruling or an investigator’s decision, and in both cases, a reasonable assumption that the person is in possession of a prohibited item.
During a search, a person has the right to request the presence of a lawyer and to refuse to conduct this event until his or her arrival.
Citizens are concerned about whether there are any footage taken of their undressing procedure. The representative of the Social Justice Center also has questions about this issue. Mariam notes that, as a rule, video surveillance cameras are installed in the detention center and on the territory of the police building. However, they do not have access to information about whether the undressing procedure is being conducted under the supervision of cameras.