Police ‘of little help’ to Cologne sexual assault victims

Many of the women harassed and groped in Cologne on New Year’s Eve were spared an even worse fate only because they were wearing tights, a police officer on duty that night has testified.

Almost a year after chaotic scenes in the western German city, a state parliamentary inquiry in Düsseldorf is investigating the night’s attacks, allegations of massive police failure and a large-scale involvement of foreign nationals and asylum seekers.

Some 1,200 women have filed criminal complaints, including 500 sexual assault complaints. Because the inquiry has declined to invite victims to testify, however, a woman police officer and a local psychologist have spoken for them.

The police officer on duty that night, identified only as Sonja E, recalled four young women telling her they had been surrounded by about 50 men who pulled up their skirts, and grabbed them on the bottom and breasts.

The young women were “completely distraught, weeping, utterly overwhelmed” at how the men had tried to penetrate them with their fingers.

“It wasn’t possible because they all were wearing tights,” said the police officer, who saw men chasing each other with broken beer bottles and throwing bangers at passersby, and each other.

‘Feeling of helplessness’

Also testifying in Düsseldorf was Dr Rudolf Egg, a psychologist who has treated scores of victims of the Cologne attacks.

One woman told him: “The worst was the feeling of helplessness. I saw nothing the whole time, only felt, because my eyes were so full of tears.”

Many women complained that police officers they sought out were “of little help”, he said, turning away or pretending to take phone calls when approached. One woman said a woman police officer told her: “You’re from Cologne, so you know that you can’t go out here.”

In response, Dr Egg told the inquiry: “It is unbearable when some women are given the feeling they contributed to something like this.”

The psychologist attacked the response of Cologne police. They put out a press release on January 1st saying there had been no incidents of note in the city and, when challenged, said the scale of the attacks only became clear from January 4th on.

200 complaints on New Year’s Day

Dr Egg said that his research had revealed that 200 women had filed criminal complaints on New Year’s Day alone. The inquiry has also heard recordings of emergency phone calls from the night, with one reporting that men were throwing bangers at women with prams.

“This is really a borderline situation, we’ve been groped a lot, there’s police officers standing here, doing nothing,” the caller continued.

The psychologist told the inquiry that he did not believe that the the attacks were co-ordinated, but that passersby became opportunistic perpetrators when they realised their actions would have no consequences.

“A legal vacuum sprang up in which perpetrators were able to do whatever they wanted,” said Dr Egg.

His damning verdict: a more visible police presence in the area between train station and the cathedral could have prevented the wave of assaults and rapes.

The inquiry will continue to hear witnesses until next month with its report due in April.