PoliceGerman court rules that police officers in North Rhine-Westphalia must be at least 163cm tall

A German court in North Rhine-Westphalia on Thursday has ruled that three women who are shorter than 163 centimeters cannot become police officers. The court upheld the North Rhine-Westphalia’s police rule that officers must meet the minimum height requirement of 163 centimeters (5 feet and 3.5 inches).

Lawyers for the police argued that small officers are hard to see in a crowd, and that hips of shorter people tend to be too narrow to attach all the police tools.

Business Insider reports that three female police recruits, who were 161.5cm, 162cm, and 162.2cm tall, had argued the regulation was discriminatory, since it was less likely that women would reach the minimum height requirement.

The law originally required that height of male officers be at least 168cm, but after a legal challenge, it was made gender neutral by stipulating the both male and female officers must be at least 163cm tall.

The three women were informed that they would have to end their police training next week.

The Münster High Administrative Court found that “the employer is entitled to a degree of freedom” and “according to a comprehensive investigation by a state working group, it was only possible to assume police service suitability from a height of 163cm.”

The Süddeutsche Zeitung reports that the working group’s report had concluded that a body height between 160cm and 162.9cm led to unacceptable risks in terms of carrying out duties, and also posed risks to the safety of other police officers.

“The fact that more women than men would be excluded from the police service because of the different average body sizes is justified by the legitimate purpose of ensuring that the police can properly carry out its duties, and therefore that this important state institution can function,” the court documents said.

“Candidates would have to be suitable for all possible tasks,” the court said, and “the state should not make an exemption for smaller, particularly strong and trained candidates.” 

The Münster court ruling contradicts an August ruling by a court in Düsseldorf, which ruled that a woman who was 161.5cm tall could not be dismissed from the police only because of her height.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung reports that experts who testified on behalf of the North Rhine-Westphalia’s police said that people shorter than 163cm into the police force would have problems with tasks such as climbing onto chairs during apartment searches, difficulties handling fire blankets when trying to extinguish a person on fire, and the potential for small officers to be overlooked during traffic control.

The experts also relied on medical findings that small people have such narrow hips that it is not possible to attach all of the police officer’s tools, such as a gun and flashlight.

In September last year, the High Administrative Court ruled that the minimum height of 168cm for male police applicants was illegal under Basic Law. The court said that if 163cm is a sufficient height for women to carry all necessary police tasks, then it should be a sufficient for male officers as well.

Analysts note that height requirements for police officers in Germany vary from state to state, with some states having the height requirements for male and female officers; other states having a higher minimum height for male officers; and some having no height requirement at all.

The three women who had their police training in North Rhine-Westphalia stopped, will find that their heights is less of a problem in Berlin (165cm for men, 160cm for women), Rhineland Palatinate (162cm for both male and female officers), and Baden-Wurttemberg, Hamburg, Hesse, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia, all with a gender-neutral height minimum of 160cm.