Romania's Roma
Robert and Florea Ioru, two brothers of Daniel Radu, a 22-year-old father of one, who was killed after a police chase last June. His family have never spoken to the media before. But standing around a single electric heater in their tumbledown cottage in Tei, north Bucharest, they tell The Independent what happened.
According to his mother, Garofitsa, Daniel and a friend had been stealing materials from an abandoned building last June to construct a new roof on the family home. While driving back through town on a moped, they encountered a police car and made a break for it. Both Daniel and his friend jumped from a bridge into a lake that runs behind Tei.
While the two men were stranded in the lake, police fired three shots at them. The third hit Daniel above the eye, killing him instantly. "They could have waited for him to get out of the lake but instead they shot him," his mother explains. "He was no danger to anyone. If he was guilty of a crime, they should have put him in prison, not killed him."
The police have yet to comment publicly on the shooting and say they will not do so until the results of an ongoing investigation are revealed
(These photos were taken for an article I wrote in February 2013 for The Independent newspaper on persecution of the Roma. The article can be found here: goo.gl/ln4Ax)
Romania's Roma
Robert and Florea Ioru, two brothers of Daniel Radu, a 22-year-old father of one, who was killed after a police chase last June. His family have never spoken to the media before. But standing around a single electric heater in their tumbledown cottage in Tei, north Bucharest, they tell The Independent what happened.
According to his mother, Garofitsa, Daniel and a friend had been stealing materials from an abandoned building last June to construct a new roof on the family home. While driving back through town on a moped, they encountered a police car and made a break for it. Both Daniel and his friend jumped from a bridge into a lake that runs behind Tei.
While the two men were stranded in the lake, police fired three shots at them. The third hit Daniel above the eye, killing him instantly. "They could have waited for him to get out of the lake but instead they shot him," his mother explains. "He was no danger to anyone. If he was guilty of a crime, they should have put him in prison, not killed him."
The police have yet to comment publicly on the shooting and say they will not do so until the results of an ongoing investigation are revealed
(These photos were taken for an article I wrote in February 2013 for The Independent newspaper on persecution of the Roma. The article can be found here: goo.gl/ln4Ax)