Hamburger Gitter (OmeU)

In the organizer's words:

The film's trailer has already generated considerable interest on social media, just a few weeks before the first anniversary of the events in Hamburg. The film focuses on the actions of the police and judiciary, with twelve experts and five victims taking stock.

The film asks: Which guarantees of the Basic Law were able to withstand the G20 summit? How easily were the authorities able to act? Which methods of the exceptional situation are slowly becoming the norm? And what kind of society is emerging on the horizon? Answers will be provided by Rafael Behr (Professor of Police Science, Hamburg Police Academy), Christiane Schneider (Hamburg Parliament), Heribert Prantl (Editor-in-Chief, Süddeutsche Zeitung); the press spokesman for the Hamburg police; the young activist Fabio V., who spent four months in custody, his lawyer and RAV board member, Gabriele Heinecke; and many others from the police, media, academia, judiciary and activism.

The background: up to 170 investigators are working on hundreds of cases against demonstrators and people who took part in riots and looting. Harsh sentences have been demanded and imposed in over 40 cases so far. The state lost control in Hamburg in the summer of 2017 and is now trying to regain it. "By any means necessary" has rarely been taken as literally as in the case of the G20 proceedings. A public search on an unprecedented scale put over two hundred people "in the pillory" with vague suspicions and the tabloid press "played deputy sheriff". 30 apartments and houses were searched on highly dubious grounds and a left-wing media portal was banned by the Minister of the Interior.

An editorial group from the video collective "leftvision" investigated the question of whether the powers of the security authorities should be put to the test. Is there a danger that genuine political crises will break all the legal barriers that are supposed to protect citizens from state arbitrariness? 13 cameramen filmed the footage during the G20 days, creating a comprehensive and detailed panorama in this documentary. Assessments by 17 protagonists form the content thread of a film that goes far beyond the events of July 2017.