Schoolboy 'without reason' arrested: "Am I a terrorist?"

Yassine Boubout (18) says he Wijnegem Monday at the mall (near Antwerp) saw heavily armed agents, but did not realize that they were there for him. Someone had called him as a terrorist and the police, confirmed a spokesman for the police to RTL Nieuws.

When the guy at the checkout had to settle was two sides of a weapon on him. He had in his own words on his knees. "Full of fear, adrenaline and amazement I asked stiffened what the reason was that there was a gun on me was targeted." He did not answer, he says. "I kept shouting that I am a student who just left school. Full of fear I kept asking for my rights. To explain this arrest. I got no answer."

Twenty minutes at the knees
It went a little further, writes Boubout on Facebook. "Am I a terrorist? Is this because I am a Muslim? Have I done something wrong? These were the questions that arose in me." His school bag was searched, his school stuff thrown on the ground. Twenty minutes he was on his knees, hands, arms constantly on him. "His finger was on the trigger. One false move and I had gotten a bullet through my head." The agents found nothing, but took him to the office.

A few hours he spent in prison, the police confirmed. Self Boubout reported that he heard nothing during those hours. "There I was on a mattress in a concrete box with no windows and only artificial light. Lying I began to wonder again what could be the reason. But I understood that there was no need. The only reason would be may be, is my ethnicity, how I look and what I looked like. A Muslim. "

When he finally got the chance to speak to an agent, he was released. "I looked at him in amazement, but also gratitude and asked if I had to make a statement or get more info would be done about this. He replied that he only knew that I met the description of a suspect."

There Boubout believe any of it. "The person next to me had the exact same clothing, like other students." Sweatpants, a backpack? "If so, then the police have been engaged in addressing people unnecessarily. There was another reason. The reason I am a Moroccan."

Police response
The police deny opposite RTL Nieuws certainly that was the reason. A spokesman confirmed that Yassine Boubout was arrested at the mall. "A woman had called us and said that the boy suspicious saw:. Tinted with gray trousers with a rucksack on images we saw that he went shopping and he went several times to the toilet We took no risk. and sent two teams down. "

According to the spokesman was not possible to speak with Boubout or interrogate him quiet. "He started right about stigma and rage that we him only because he had to have a Muslim 'is."

Then he was in fact worked against the ground and taken to the police station. Later it turned out that it was a case of mistaken identity; Boubout proved innocent. The boy on the security footage showed someone else with a similar description. "Communication between the two teams on the ground was not good and we had the wrong," said the spokesman.

No apologies from police
"That's unfortunate," he admits, but he would not hear of excuses. "We do not. If he had just worked, there had been nothing wrong." According to the spokesperson, the police at all notifications off if someone looks suspicious. And they get a lot of messages inside. "We can not take any chances. And that's a shame for some people."

Boubout says he's "absurd" thinks the police react so. According to the student, there are amateur snapshots and there are images of the shop will confirm his story. "The truth is the best policy," he says. He also refers to his lawyer.

RTL News/© AFP