17.11.08 - 17:55 -
The death of an 18-year-old youth at a fashionable discotheque in Madrid has renewed the controversy in Spain about the excess violence sometimes employed by bouncers in the unregulated night-club sector.
The controversy has been reopened in the wake of the death this weekend of a young Spaniard who was so "brutally" attacked by three doormen, security guards at the Madrid disco El Balcón de Rosales, that they killed him, according to some witnesses of the incident.
The three security guards are in custody for the suspected homicide of the youth, Álvaro Ussia.
His death has once again raised the question in Spain about cases of excess violence employed by some discotheque bouncers.
Most of Spain's autonomous communities, or regions, have no regulations governing the hiring of security personnel in these kinds of recreational establishments.
Guards are not asked to show any particular certification, nor are their responsibilities defined.
The National Union of Local Police Chiefs and Directors, or Unijepol, demanded on Monday a reform of laws governing private security and the "legal certification" of the figure of "security personnel in recreational establishments."
According to Unijepol, personnel charged with security duties in recreational establishments are beyond any administrative control and are chosen by owners of these clubs for their "physical strength or knowledge of the martial arts."
For that reason the association demands the regulation and specification of requirements for the hiring and training of these guards, as well as the equipment they should use and the actions they are to take.
In recent years several young people have died in Spain at the hands of bouncers in pubs and discotheques.
One of the worst cases occurred on Jan. 27, 2002, in the Maremagnum resort area in Barcelona, where the Ecuadorian citizen Wilson Pacheco was struck a brutal blow before being thrown in the waters of the port by three doormen at the Caipirinha discotheque, who had previously barred him from entering the club.
