Prague, Jan 7 (CTK) – Czech police officers must tip off their superiors about the tattooed members of the police corps within a campaign that is to suppress the skin art among the police, daily Pravo writes yesterday.
The police command has started checking whether men and women in uniforms observe the ban on tattooing on visible parts of their bodies, it adds.
The ban took effect last summer and it relates both to the police recruits and veterans across the Czech Republic, Pravo writes.
The size and motive of the tattooing are irrelevant, it adds.
The police command, which assigns the police officers, recommends that they observe more carefully whether some in their midst have tattooing. If they discover it, they must tell their superiors, Pravo writes.
“Tattooing will not be tolerated,” this is written in the minutes from a police conference held in the Prague 1 district at the close of last year, Pravo writes.
“All those present should be acquainted with the position on the issue of tattooing adopted by the police command,” it adds.
“Last August, the occurrence [of tattooing] among the police was checked,” the minutes said.
“The relevant senior police officers should be informed, the affair should be observed and the police officers should be consistently warned,” it added.
Police commanders should be informed about the creation of “mannequins” on which problematic places are marked, Pravo writes.
These are computer silhouettes where arms, shoulders, the face and feet are marked in red, it adds.
Under the “mannequin,” every police recruit states that there is no tattooing on the marked places of their bodies.
If a police officer is caught having a “piece” on the neck or forearm, “they must have it removed,” police command spokeswoman Ivana Nguyenova is quoted as saying.
If a police officer does not remove a visible tattooing, they may be liable to a financial penalty, Nguyenova said.
“However, I do not know any case of a police commander making such a decision. The police officer in question simply covers up the place, perhaps by a tape,” she added.
The paper describes the opposite examples of Britain and the USA. In the former, tattooing among the police is now being suppressed, while in the latter it is quite common.
