The Czech Constitutional Court earlier this month upheld a woman’s criminal complaint against the police, which alleged that they did not properly investigate her allegations of inhuman and degrading treatment by hospital staff during her childbirth.

The attending nurse applied pressure to the woman as she was in labor, without any reason or warning, causing life-threatening bleeding and breaking the baby's collarbone. She later filed a criminal complaint against the nurse and attending doctor for assault and inhuman treatment, but the police did little to investigate: their only interview was with the nurse.

The Constitutional Court agreed with the petitioner that the investigation was entirely inadequate because the police did not question her or the doctor who was conducting the birth. Police also had not prepared independent expert evidence and denied the complainant access to the police file. Thus the requirements of effective investigation were not fulfilled, namely the involvement of the complainant in the investigation.

The court said that this was an investigation which, according to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, had to meet the following basic criteria: it must be independent and impartial, thorough and adequate, prompt and subjected to public control. The court ruled that Czech police had failed to meet these conditions.

"This case is of great importance for other women who are exposed to obstetric violence in Czech hospitals. Examples include interventions without the consent or even against the will of women. In this particular case it involved pushing on the abdomen, a widely prohibited procedure, which resulted in a life-threatening situation for the woman. There are well documented cases of the mother or child dying following this procedure," said Zuzana Candigliota, a lawyer with the League of Human Rights.