Crime: Berlin bans mention of migration background

But these statistics no longer exist. Already at the end of July, the interior administration of the red-red-green senate had secretly decreed “that the recording of the migration background is to be discontinued at the earliest possible date”. Until now, this could be ticked off with a simple mouse click. But since the third of August, the function has been deactivated.

Migration background versus data protection

At one time, the purpose of the survey was to find out whether ancestry could be one of the reasons why young people become criminals. It was also important because almost all young people of Arab origin who are attributed to clan criminality now have a German passport. The statistics are considerably distorted if one only differentiates according to nationality.

The Berlin Senate justified the ban by saying that the findings were never used for preventive measures or other legal tasks. Therefore, the collection of this personal data violated data protection.

As the BZ reported, the police union (GdP) criticized the move. Press spokesman Benjamin Jendro commented: “Such misunderstood tolerance is grist to the mills of right-wing extremists and conspiracy theorists.”