‘Face can be beaten depending on aggressiveness,’ Spanish police officer tells court about referendum

A Spanish police inspector has told a judge that "a face can be beaten depending on the aggressiveness." He justified this way a blow a woman received by an officer carrying a baton on the October 2017 referendum day.

He made the remarks before a Barcelona local court, where on Tuesday the first officers testified over the Spanish police crackdown during the independence vote, which left 1,000 injured across the country, according to the Catalan health department.

Some footage from the Escola Mediterrània, in Barcelona, which was used as a polling station that day, showed some people with blood on their faces.

One of the officers who testified said that he did not see them at that time and only watched the footage in the media afterwards, and claimed that it is impossible to say whether "it was blood or paint."

Irídia human rights group

The human rights group Irídia claims such comments are "very serious" and also argued that beating someone in the face is "unlawful and it is forbidden."