The long-lasting anti-Roma discrimination in Europe’s criminal justice systems

Fair Trials, a global criminal justice watchdog, exposes the existing discrimination within Europe’s criminal justice systems. Their research focuses on four countries: Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Spain. Their findings prove that the Roma community faces discriminatory attitudes and biases at every step of a criminal process, leading to a change in the outcome. This makes them very vulnerable within a system that is supposed to treat them equally and fairly. Similar attitudes were found in people whose role is to protect Roma, such as defence lawyers.

Adding to this is the lack of resources or alternatives for Roma to find and access an impartial legal system. Severe findings were found in all criminal justice system’s categories: police, judges and prosecutors, and defence lawyers. Some police officers had no problem admitting to using ethnic profiling, while some judges made offensive remarks towards their Roma colleagues. Fair Trials points out the perception which portrays Roma as ignorant and insubordinate within the criminal justice system. This type of discrimination can only be tackled if structural racism is combated.