The 11th hearing in the lawsuit seeking state compensation in the case of Ms. Suraj was held.

On Friday, September 13, 2013, from 10:00 to 17:00, the 11th hearing of the national compensation lawsuit in the case of Mr. Suraj was held. This hearing involved questioning of the immigration officials who accompanied him during his deportation. By around 9:15, a line of people seeking spectator tickets had already begun to form, and since the number of people exceeded the capacity of the spectator gallery, attendance was determined by lottery.

During the questioning of the five immigration bureau officials, the defense lawyers sharply pointed out inconsistencies between what each official said immediately after the incident and their current statements. Perhaps aware of the positional asphyxiation we are claiming, the immigration bureau officials seemed to be extremely cautious in their testimony about the "bent-over" position (perhaps even perjuring).

Furthermore, what I gathered from the responses of all the staff members was that there was absolutely no consideration for Mr. Suraj, the person who was being escorted at the time of the incident.
"This was our second attempt at deportation (the first one failed), so we didn't want to fail again," said the official (perhaps the success of the deportation was the top priority, and the lives of the deporters were secondary?).
"We felt we needed to be careful because there had been an incident in the past where an African person became violent during a forced deportation," said the official (this kind of prejudice against Africans may have led to the rough treatment of Suraj and ultimately to his death).
"When Mr. Suraj stopped responding, we couldn't check his pulse, but we thought he was faking it, so we didn't take any emergency measures on board," said the staff member (it's impossible to stop your pulse by faking it).
All of these thoughtless actions can be said to have led to the death of Suraj.

The realities of the deportation process that have come to light are not limited to Ms. Suraj's forced deportation, but are also common in regular deportations. If these deportation practices are not reformed in the wake of Ms. Suraj's death, the opportunity to review the current inhumane deportation practices will be lost. I truly believe that this lawsuit seeking state compensation is of great significance in that sense.

The next deadline is Wednesday, October 23, 2013.This is the questioning of the doctor who examined Suraj's heart and other related individuals.The next session will also start at 10:00 AM, and admission tickets will be distributed.Any changes to the schedule or other information will be posted on the APFS website and other platforms. We appreciate your cooperation in attending the next session as well.