Tree Suffers in Kuwaiti Police No Nonsense Approach

Picture the scene, it’s a Saturday in Kuwait City and a young boy is behaving in a manner familiar with many teen boys across the world, he just wants to have a little fun, and like most other boys that fun requires a level of noise! Boisterous behaviour was not however what the neighbours of the boy wanted and called upon the police to stop the noise.

A little uncertain of what might happen to him, the boy fled the Kuwaiti police officers when they showed up at the address and climbed up a 90 year old tree near the property. Despite several pleas to get the boy down, he refused and opted to stay up the tree.

The police were in no mood to just leave the scene, and in doing so failing to play into the boys hands, who assumed they might just go away. But the bungling officers rather than climbing up the tree (they were afraid of heights) decided to bring the boy closer to them. In what has been described as a criminal act by witnesses, the police took a chainsaw to the base of the tree causing the boy and the tree to fall to the ground.

The boy who cannot be named for legal reasons, was injured in the fall and rushed to hospital, but later released to recover at home. The tree however was less lucky, three transplants (from different locations) and 90 years of growth were bought to an end because of the boys behaviour.

Police in Kuwait City apparently spend up to 40% of their time handling noise related crimes, the penalty for repeat “adult” offenders can be a heavy fine and removal of items causing said noise.

While the cutting down of a tree may not sound like a major news stories, trees in the heavily developed city are notoriously difficult to grow and maintain, the very reason this particular tree was moved several times, as a result trees can often cost considerably more than in other countries or even other areas of Kuwait.