Sunday, May 27, 2012

Interview Neringa Venckiene: I go into politics


Neringa Venckiene: The Fight for the Girl is not Over yet

  1. (Translation from Lithuanian;  posted in “Respublika” by Sidas Aksomaitis on 26 May 2012)
  2.  
  3. This week’s “Respublika” person of the week – Kaunas District Civil Court judge Neringa Venckiene, who after several years of fighting for his brother’s Drasius Kedys daughter has lost the girl and is feeling severe pressure from politicians and juridical system officers, but who still believes, that her fight is not over yet.
  4.  
  5.  
  6. Journalist: Do you feel defeated after the fight with the system that has taken away the girl and now has intentions to put you behind bars?
  7.  
  8. Neringa Venckiene: If we look at it as a whole, then it is all so horrible and disgusting, but I have put up with and suffered so much in these last four years, that it does not even bother me too much that they have plans to take away my  immunity. I am much more scared for the girl, because they took her away as a thing, only that “thing” was shouting and screaming… I cannot find proper words to describe how the child rights representatives were behaving in and after this situation.
  9.  
  10. After the abduction of the girl, I was writing every single day to the Kaunas District and Kaunas City child rights specialists, asking to bind Laima Stankunaite to allow me to see my niece. From Kaunas District child rights I found out that my requests have been sent to Kaunas City child rights protection department, and from this department’s head Bitute Daugeliene I got an answer, that my requests “will be decided upon according to the existing laws and regulations”. This is how the child rights work here…
  11.  
  12. Only because of such bureaucrats I will fight that each and every one of them would be punished. The girl lived in my home for the last four years, was healed from the perverts’ abuse with all my effort, and now they even do not allow me to see her!
  13.  
  14.  
  15. Journalist: Why prosecutors are so eagerly attacking you, while they take upon the ones who wasted millions through their criminal activities only after long convincing?
  16.  
  17. Neringa Venckiene: They are afraid of me – even in the Parliament everyone is terrified from the thought that I might go into politics. I can tell you, that I do not need their politics, but I will never back down.  And while not giving up I have no other choice – only to become a politician. I need this in order that the politicians of today, who are trying their best to put me behind bars, would be held responsible for their own violations and criminal acts. For this very reason – I have no other choice. And they are very well aware of this, they expect me to enter politics and that is why they are trying to eliminate me in all possible ways.
  18.  
  19. It is hard to say what kind of influence politicians have on the prosecutors, but the prosecutor general, Darius Valys, showed not his best side in his appeal to the parliament.
  20.  
  21. I definitely had a better opinion about D. Valys – I thought that an officer from a province will not be corrupt and will be trying to make changes in the system, but now it is clear, that he is singing to the same tune of Kestutis Betingis and Algimantas Kliunka , and others sympathizing with them.
  22.  
  23.  
  24. Journalist: Is it possible to reach that the system would investigate the crime instead of dragging the person who reported the crime from court room to court room?
  25.  
  26. Neringa Venckiene: After what has happened to our family, I would never do as we did. I have learned my lesson. Now they blame me that I have said that there is no justice and this country is not a juridical country…Until this tragedy came upon our family, I was completely convinced that there is justice in this country. For this very reason, I helped my brother to fight according to the laws. But now, I would never ever ask for help from such system – I do not need any help neither from the prosecutors’ office, nor courts. I used all possible juridical means to protect the girl, but still could not reach that the guilty ones would be punished and the murderer of my brother Drasius would be indentified. Now the only way to attain this is to go into parliament. If ones dare to kill, others dare to drag the girl by force while breaking my arms, it means they can do anything.
  27.  
  28.  
  29. Journalist: What do you think an ordinary person should do to receive justice?
  30.  
  31. Neringa Venckiene: We need to unite and swipe out the Parliament and the juridical system, and start all over again from the scratch, because it is impossible to live anymore with what we have now. There are no words to describe the level of corruption in Lithuania today. There are only few just and decent people in today’s ruling power and juridical system, but the remaining mass is horrifying. Those corrupt should not even dream that people do not know about their criminal acts – Lithuania is small, here everyone knows who takes bribes, and who doesn’t. Everyone knows the names of the officers that can be bribed and even the sums of money they ask.
  32.  
  33.  
  34. Journalist: So what is the reason that everything stays as it is except for a few sacrifices and the judges still claim they are impeccable even though people know who is corrupted?
  35.  
  36. Neringa Venckiene: This is the practice of the head of the Lithuanian Highest Court (LAT) Gintaras Kryzevicius, when those who sympathize with him get one kind of treatment, and those who have opposing views are treated differently. I am from the latter ones, that’s why I am getting disciplinary warnings one after another. After more than ten years of practice as a judge, I have not received even one complaint or warning for not performing my duties properly. I am getting so many of them only now, when I am doing all I can to protect my niece from the perverts. Even the opinion of the committee of judges matches that of Laima Stankunaite. What I think is that we now have Lithuania of many Stankunaite – in parliament, in courts and in prosecutors’ office.
  37.  
  38.  
  39. Journalist: You say that people should unite and fight the system, but as you remember the protest in front of the parliament that was organized by Romualdas Ozolas and Bronislovas Genzelis, the signatories of the Independence Restitution Act, has showed that  initiatives like that can lead to endless days in court rooms.
  40.  
  41. Neringa Venckiene: This is utterly shocking. So why don’t they give permits to allow protests and gatherings? Why the politicians that have been elected by people do not want to hear those very people? They need to allow express the opinion publicly, since in no other democratic country no one opposes the protests. I think the main reason is that the ones in ruling power are afraid of honest people who could replace all the corrupt ones. Let’s put together all the judges, politicians, police heads – and you will see that their number is nothing compared to the number of ordinary people. If all those people would unite and rise up to the fight against the corrupt system – what we see happening today would come to an end very quickly. That is why they are doing all they can so that the society remains divided.
  42.  
  43. Two disciplinary cases, which were raised against Neringa Venckiene by the Judges’ Ethics and Disciplinary Committee, have been analyzed by Judges’ Honor Court yesterday and united into one disciplinary case.
  44. The Judges’ Honor Court will announce on 22nd June if they will propose to the president Dalia Grybauskaite to terminate Neringa Venckiene.
  45. One of the cases that had been raised against Neringa Venckiene was for the incident that happened on 9th January in Garliava Family Clinic, where Neringa Venckiene was trying with no success to get a health check-up certificate for the homeschooling program for her niece. As Neringa Venckiene claims, the GP had registered her niece with the doctors’ committee for consultation, but the doctors would not even agree to see the girl.
  46. Another case was raised after the Bailiffs’ Presidium has reported that the judge (Neringa Venckiene) was asking for the bailiff Sonata Vaicekauskiene, who was hiding the details of the second attempt to take away the girl, to be filmed day and night.
  47. (prepared by the daily newspaper “Respublika”)

No comments:

Post a Comment