A police officer in Tilburg was unexpectedly attacked by a suspect on Saturday night around 3.30 a.m. When he tried to call emergency assistance with his two-way radio and emergency button, he failed several times, he writes Twitter.
Agent Koen Simmers and his colleague saw a man pulling a woman towards the bushes and abusing them during their night shift on the Noordhoekring in Tilburg.
When Simmers followed the man, the police said he had to endure an “explosion of violence”, with several blows to his face and body.
At that time, Simmers tried to call emergency assistance with his radio, but this failed several times. The emergency button also did not work twice, says Simmers, who is also the main director of the Dutch police union.
“I fought hard to defend myself,” the officer writes Twitter.
Eventually, the agents succeeded in calling emergency assistance. The suspect has been arrested with “a lot of resistance, violence and the use of pepper spray”, the police write down Facebook. According to the police, it was probably a relational conflict. The man appeared to be under the influence of alcohol.
Much criticism of brand new communication system
There is a lot of criticism within the police about the recently rolled out communication system C2000, which has been in use by the emergency services for more than a month.
Simmers writes that there are still major C2000 problems within the Zeeland West Brabant unit and that they play day and night.
“It is a bad thing if the system did not work and we will report it,” says a spokesperson for the Zeeland West Brabant unit. She says that the unit has received several reports about the C2000 system.
Case is picked up by aftercare team
The Ministry of Justice, which is responsible for the system, stated in a written response: “Obviously, the safety of police officers is a priority for the minister and police department. Every incident is investigated by the aftercare team, which consists of experts.”
The Central Works Council (OR) previously wrote a fire letter to the police force over C2000. Police union ACP also said there were major problems with the system. Chief of police Erik Akerboom acknowledged the problems and says that they have “full attention”.
C2000 is also used by, among others, the ambulance services, parts of defense, the fire brigade and the AIVD.
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