Aleh Vouchak: Interior Ministry covers brutality of store security guards

Security guards at stores have no rights to use physical force even against shoplifters.

Former prosecution investigator Aleh Vouchak spoke to charter97.org about beating of customers by security officers at a Euroopt store in Homel.

“Such actions by security guards at stores have become a tendency. What worries my colleagues and me most of all is that they think they won't be punished. No criminal cases have been initiated for abuse of power. They don't have the right to use physical force even against shoplifters. It may be done by police officers, KGB officers and so on, but not by security guards at stores,” the lawyer thinks.

The human rights activists is confident that brutality goes unpunished because security departments in most supermarkets are headed by former top police officers.

“As far as I know, the security department at Korona hypermarket is headed by a former chief of the7th department of the Interior Ministry. They have their own corporation where members cover one another. We already saw how CCTV footage 'disappear' and detained people injure their heads themselves,” says the head of the organisation Legal Assistance to Citizens.

He adds that security officers have hard work, but it mustn't mean they can be rude to people.

“This job has a high turnover, so sometimes people without professional training in law-enforcement bodies are hired. Besides physical training, they are supposed to have psychological trainings to know how to detect and stop shoplifters. I cannot say it is a bad practice to employ former law-enforcement officers as security guards, but they must understand their service in the law-enforcement agencies is left behind. Such actions harm the image of a company. Korona and other hypermarkets save their reputation only because they are monopolists. If we had a real market, people would stop visiting these stores,” Aleh Vouchak believes.

Customers of a Euroopt supermarket in Homel were beaten by security guards until they bled because they didn't pay for a chocolate bar.