On August 27, 2022, 24-year-old Karim Sayari was with his friends in the neighborhood near his house when he was pursued by a police patrol in the same area. Subsequently, he was arrested and subjected to physical assault and gas diffusion to immobilize his movement. According to the testimony of the victim’s sister to a media outlet, the police beat Karim on the head with batons and then took him to the National Security Police Station in Menzel Bourguiba when he was unconscious and in critical condition. Later, he was transferred to the Regional Hospital in Menzel Bourguiba in the same critical state, but his health condition deteriorated, and he passed away under mysterious circumstances. The security authorities have kept the events and causes of his death obscured in secrecy. Eventually, the Ministry of Interior published a statement denying any connection between the police force and the death of Karim Sayari. They claimed that the victim’s death was the outcome of him swallowing a quantity of narcotics during his capture. This narrative is a recurrent pattern that the Ministry of Interior has used in previous official explanations in past cases that resemble Karim’s situation.

Moreover, the police did not stop there. Karim Sayari’s funeral, which took place on August 29, 2022, was marred by the use of tear gas. Security forces even raided neighboring houses, causing residents to suffer from suffocation, and police vehicles surrounded the neighborhood and assaulted the youth attending their friend’s funeral. Furthermore, the police arrested several young people in Tinja in connection with the protests that took place days after the death of Karim Sayari.