PERSECUCIONES EN ESPAÑA

Hi Henry.

I'm not exactly an adolescent, but I'd like to give you an instance of homophobia which was directed against me in Alpedrete (Madrid) last summer. It made the TV news and the main papers (e.g. see El Pais, 1st of August 2001).

I've always lived in Madrid. My boyfriend and I (he's called Jesus) decided we'd like some rural peace so we rented a flat in the middle of Alpedrete.

It's a village of 9,000 inhabitants and they knew all about us straight away, although they never bothered us. But one of the local policeman began to take notice of us. His number is P103, and they call him "El Churrero" ["The Hunk"].

We used to take our dog Otto into the parks. This policeman would shadow us, trying to hear what we were saying.

So all we could talk about was the weather, what the dog was up to, where we were going to in the evening, and stuff like that.

Of course we weren't going to snog in the park, that's what our house was for!

But even so, he couldn't have said anything because we live in a free society. Don't we?

This man continued to spy on us rather than protect the village from crime. At night there's only one patrol car with two policemen in it. He would wait in the car with another officer, ignoring radio calls to attend emergencies (you know, burglaries, fights, traffic accidents…) and all because his colleague was busy watching a couple of poofs!

On the 31st of July, 2001, he told me that I should call in at the police station. I went along, with Jesus, thinking that they only wanted to see some document or other, as they often do (usually something to do with the electoral register or some traffic regulation).

But when we got in they closed the doors behind us.

He started with a punch which broke two of my teeth, and cut my head. They began insulting me, saying that if my bottom wasn't getting enough action, they'd give it some themselves.

They kept us about an hour, using all kind of insults and taunts. He even stuck his crotch in my mouth.

Things got worse, and he ended up giving me his police gun and telling me to shoot myself, and if I didn't he'd do it for me.

The other policeman was more frightened than we were, so in the end he called the chief. The bully snatched the phone and said "we've got the queers here, we're going to kill them."

The boss arrived, after a quarter of an hour, and asked us why we were there. We asked him the same thing. He told us we weren't under arrest. I showed him my teeth, and he said it was impossible that El Churrero would have done that.

You know how it is, they cover up for each other.

We went to a medical centre. Later we filed a complaint in court number 5 of Collado-Villalba, asking for the policeman to have his pistol taken away.

The judge told us it couldn't be done.

While we'd been in the police station I'd called 112 [one of the emergency numbers in Spain] and the whole conversation had been recorded. They'd brought it as evidence.

The authorities didn't take any action against the policeman, claiming that he belonged to the village and we didn't!

In a way they were right. You have to realise that small villages still boast the same old fascists, although nowadays they were the cloak of respectability afforded by political parties.

They didn't use any official channels to get rid of us. They just stirred up the villagers, and seven or eight of them made it their business to insult and persecute us. For example, one day they tried to push us off our scooter.

I'm not going to tell you where we live now, for our own safety. I will say that we've been abandoned by groups such as COGAM, who offered us legal advice but we paid for our lawyers ourselves.

The only person who got concerned about it was Esteban Ibarra, of Amnesty International's campaign against intolerance.

COGAM has completely ignored us. I hate to say it, but that's how it is.

They must be too busy organising the carnival for 2002 (is THAT their idea of gay pride ?).

The November edition of Zero has an article on aggression against homosexuals which mentions my case and tells how to cope with it if it happens to you.

What annoys me most is that the policeman in question is probably a latent homosexual himself. We're sure that the whole thing happened because of his own frustrated feelings.

My name is Luciano Diaz del Pino. I don't mind if you print it, as I believe in freedom of expression.

Well, that's all. Please keep your site going and I hope that this section will soon become redundant when, at last, we will have eliminated bullying, discrimination, and intolerance.

Best wishes,

Luciano


Luciano