The hospital of Ceuta sends the judge about twenty parts of injury cases from immigrants who claim to have been assaulted by military personnel.

The hospital of Ceuta sends the judge a dozen reports of injuries from immigrants who claim to have been assaulted by military personnel The medical reports, which identify the victims and detail their injuries, are key to the judicial investigation The investigation into the alleged assaults suffered by immigrants in Ceuta at the hands of military personnel can turn the tide with the documentation that the only public hospital in the autonomous city has sent to the court. According to EL PAÍS, the hospital has informed the Justice system of at least a dozen medical reports that include the identities of the victims, the injuries they had, and their statement that the wounds were caused by members of the Army who were conducting surveillance patrols in Ceuta. So far, the complaints circulated were anonymous and lacked medical reports to support them, which led the investigation to a dead end. Since the entry of more than 70,000 people into the autonomous city on July 30 and 31, videos have circulated on social networks and in the media showing uniformed personnel beating immigrants; audio recordings in which alleged soldiers boast about having hit them and discuss whether it is better to do it with bare hands or with gloves; and images of adults and minors showing the wounds and bruises left on their bodies from the blows they claim to have received from military personnel. The human rights NGO Amnesty International (AI) published a report with evidence of mistreatment and even torture of immigrants and refugees by members of the Armed Forces on September 30th, based on 22 testimonies collected by its investigators on the ground. The Ministry of Defence has sent both the AI report and the audio recordings from eldiario.es to the Ceuta court and the Prosecutor's Office. However, all this accusatory material, which points to a practice widespread among military personnel whose mission in Ceuta is surveillance, deterrence, and support to the State Security Forces in the anomalous situation the city has been living through for almost twelve weeks, suffers from a serious lack: the aggressors are not identified, nor even the military unit to which they belong. And more importantly: the identity of the victims is not revealed, which makes it very difficult to verify. Immigrants are afraid of reprisals, and when they report their experience to NGOs or journalists, they usually hide their faces and always their names as a condition. They also do not go to the Police to report the beatings they claim to have received for fear of being expelled from the Spanish territory into which they entered illegally. Since they cannot locate the victims to ratify the complaint they made to the press or NGOs in court and cannot subject them to a medical examination to verify the injuries suffered as a result of the alleged assaults, the ongoing proceedings have been unsuccessful, legal sources admit. However, the investigation can be unlocked thanks to the documentation from the University Hospital of Ceuta, the only public hospital in the city, which manages Ingesa (National Health Management Institute), dependent on the Ministry of Health, since healthcare is not transferred to local authorities. EL PAÍS has learned from sources familiar with the investigation that the hospital of Ceuta has sent to the court the injury reports of at least two dozen immigrants who were treated in the emergency room and reported having been assaulted by military personnel. In one of these reports, which this newspaper has accessed, it reads: "30-year-old man who comes after an assault in public according to the report of the military." The diagnosis is "polytrauma". The physician's report specifies that he has "erythematous injuries and abrasions compatible with trauma by elongated objects". Another report, which the patient shows in the photograph that heads this information, refers to a 17-year-old man (minor) who "has injuries on his back". The doctor explains that the wound "looks like a belt blow" and that the patient "reports that the military personnel assaulted him". The first report is from an emergency treatment on the morning of September 13th and the second one in the afternoon-night of October 4th. In almost all cases, the immigrants point to the military, and not to police or civil guards, as the perpetrators of the assaults. The reports include the personal data of the patient, full name and identity number, if available, as well as those of the physician. Also the date of treatment, diagnosis, and treatment, accompanied by a brief description of how the patient assures that his injuries occurred. The person treated in the emergency room takes a copy of the report, while the hospital keeps the original to include it in the patient's medical record and another copy is sent to the court. This latter sending responds to the legal obligation that medical personnel have to inform the justice system of any circumstance that may indicate the commission of a crime, whether it be injuries, gender-based violence, sexual assault, or abuse of minors. Experts in international human rights law emphasize that States are obliged to investigate ex officio the cases where there are indications of mistreatment or torture by public officials, as indicated by the Amnesty International report. Therefore, it is not necessary for the affected parties to file a complaint themselves. The courts of Ceuta already have sufficient information to investigate: they have the data of two dozen immigrants to locate so that they can ratify to the judge what they told the emergency doctor. The existence of an injury report immediately following the alleged assault is also fundamental, as the most superficial ones could have disappeared when the alleged victim appears in court. Identifying the aggressors The most difficult part remains identifying the alleged aggressors, but if the date and time of the alleged assault—usually at night, according to the immigrants' account—and the specific place in Ceuta are known, it is possible to determine which military patrol was in the area at that time, in case the aggressors were indeed military personnel. The sources consulted ensure that in general the immigrants who reported in the hospital of Ceuta having been assaulted by military personnel were treated in the emergency room and did not require hospitalization, as they were traumatisms and less serious injuries, compatible with blows with long and flexible batons, called impact sticks, with which the soldiers patrolling the city are equipped. The hospital center has also treated patients with wounds from knives or machetes, but in this case, these were injuries between the immigrants themselves. Regarding sexual assaults, the victims have been, in almost all cases, immigrant women, including minors, while among the aggressors were immigrants, but also Spaniards. In addition to sending the published information to the court and the Prosecutor's Office, the Minister of Defence, Margarita Robles, ordered the Operations Command, to which the troops deployed in Ceuta are dependent, an internal investigation to "elucidate possible individual responsibilities and preserve the good conduct and name of the Armed Forces," the result of which is unknown at the moment.