He was at one point the number one victim of hate crime in the entire East Riding area
PC Mourad Karaouani has been the victim of hate crimes and racially aggravated assaults(Image: Humberside Police Federation)
A Humberside Police officer has spoken out after being the victim of 21 hate crimes and racially-aggravated assaults in the past three years. PC Mourad Karaouani was targeted so frequently he was the number one victim of hate crime across the entire East Riding at one stage.
He is now sharing his story to support the Humberside Police Federation’s Protect The Protectors: Stop Racism Against Police campaign. Mourad, who joined the force following a five-year stint as a firefighter, is based in Bridlington.
He said: “As soon as I started going to jobs, there were hate incidents every week. Even in the jobs that I wasn’t directly involved in, if I’d been called as backup, people would turn their hate towards me.
“Sometimes the suspect would say: ‘I have no issue being arrested. I’ve admitted what I’ve done is wrong. However, I don’t want him to touch me’.
“As a new officer, I was thinking, is it something I do that makes people hate me? Is it the way I speak to people?
“I’d go back to my station, put my body-worn video on and watch the way I interacted with people. It made me doubt myself.
“It was happening so often that it was reviewed by supervisors, and it was established that there was definitely nothing that I was saying that was instigating that kind of hate, it was just because of my skin colour. After a couple of months, I was surprised when a colleague from the neighbourhood team said: ‘Today in the briefing, we were told you are number one in East Riding for being a victim of hate crime’.
“I said: ‘Really?’, and he said: ‘Yeah, we literally had your picture in our briefing.’ He then reassured me that his team would attend as quickly as possible if they heard of any disturbances.”
Mourad was offered the opportunity to transfer to a “more multicultural” location where life might be easier. However, he chose to stay put.
He said: “I like my team here, and if I go somewhere else just because it’s easier for me, what about other officers? What about other people that come to Bridlington to live, and who are from different minorities or have a different skin colour?
“Why do I have to move somewhere else to avoid those kinds of incidents? In fact, those people need to change their mindset.”
In May 2024, there was a particularly concerning incident. Mourad was working a night shift when he attempted to stop a brawl between two men outside a Bridlington nightclub.
He described what happened, saying: “One of them just launched at me, grabbed my body-worn video, and tried to take off my hi vis, saying, ‘Do not record me’, and then started giving me a lot of abuse, shouting and swearing. I got him down to the floor, arrested him, and while I was on my knees handcuffing the man, I got assaulted.
“Somebody came from behind, hit me in the face and smashed my glasses. It was his partner. She was shouting and screaming in my face, calling me all the words you can imagine, the P-word, the C-word, the N-word, all of it.”
When backup officers arrived, Mourad’s body-worn camera footage captured the shocking moment the woman told them she wouldn’t attack them because they were white. Fortunately, Mourad reports such attacks have become less frequent.
He said: “I still experience those incidents; there was one at the beginning of December. But it is nowhere near as bad as it used to be. I believe that is because I had a lot of support from my teammates and my supervisor and we got robust about it.
“Whenever there is any kind of situation like that, we’ll deal with it positively, and we arrest for it, if there is grounds. Bridlington is a small town, so people see that there are consequences for their actions.”
Mourad values the support he receives from his fellow officers. He said: “It’s little things like when the control room calls me and says: ‘Can you attend this emergency? It’s a fight in progress now’, my colleagues will shout to say, ‘We’re attending as well, to assess’. Those colleagues have their own workloads, but they leave all that and go to that live job, which is potentially going to give them more work to do.
“Sergeants will also leave the station and come to assist when they hear there’s been a hate incident towards me. You don’t want to be a victim, you don’t want to be weak, you don’t want to feel like you’re getting some advantage over other colleagues. But I like to think we are all similar, we are all trying to look after each other.”
Research conducted by Humberside Police Federation as part of its anti-racism initiative revealed that more than 50 per cent of minority ethnic officers and staff had suffered racial abuse while on duty. However, some chose not to report incidents, fearing they would be perceived as troublesome or that their concerns wouldn’t be taken seriously.
Mourad acknowledged there have been occasions when he hasn’t reported every instance of verbal abuse. Nevertheless, he emphasised the importance of reporting hate crimes, saying: “If I’m a police officer in uniform, having to go through this, what would it be like for a member of the public? It could be a refugee, it could be a person who doesn’t speak the language. So to me, it is my duty to actually stay here and report it.”
Mourad expressed hope that the Federation’s anti-racism initiative would shine a light on the experiences of numerous minority ethnic police officers. He added: “People need to know that these kinds of incidents are real, they do happen, and there are some people who still have that kind of mentality. Just because you lost your temper or you had an issue, it doesn’t give you the right to start insulting people and giving them abuse.”
Humberside Police Federation Chair Lee Sims has labelled Mourad’s ordeal as ‘disgusting’ and said that the officer has the complete support of the Federation. Lee said: “What Mourad has had to endure in such a short space of time is absolutely disgusting – no police officer should ever be subject to racist abuse while they are carrying out their duty to protect the public.
“Mourad has the full support of Humberside Police Federation, and his experience illustrates exactly why we have started the Protect The Protectors: Stop Racism Against Police campaign.
“One incident is one too many, there is no room for this in society and our colleagues do not come to work to suffer any hate crime. There is simply no excuse for this abuse, and it must stop.
“There is no place for Racism – and this kind of abuse against our colleagues needs the toughest of punishments and deterrents. We all need to stand together.
“Mourad (and any other officer who is a victim of any crime) has the full support of Humberside Police Federation. His experience illustrates exactly why we have started the Protect The Protectors: Stop Racism Against Police campaign.”