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inexcusable behaviour by the officer in question.
Renews your faith in the judiciary
in other news - sherlock holmes still constipated
I have a slight feeling of "there but for the grace of God goes many a good cop"
Its too glib and simplistic to blame the cop for their actions in the heat of the momnet. Failures go much further than that. Training, briefing, management, all have a part to play as does luck. How many folk were pushed back and given a thwack when they refused that day? Every day cops restrain people far more aggressively than that.
Was the cop acting in accordence with their training and instruction?
I would far prefer to see full disclosure and thus real lessons learnt that attempting to hang a cop out to dry which causes the police to close ranks and makes it had to get full disclosure
I just hope that justice will be done for Ian and his family!
teej - agreed (a bit) but I think the change in behaviour will come from the rank & file, not from above. Next time someone in authority tells a group of trainees or a squad to rough-up a crowd if necessary, they'll likely all have this in mind. All the more so if they screw this pc over.
TJ, the video says it all for this case. The officer was clearly out of order. If it hadn't been for the multiple videos of this act then it would not have gone this far. I do accept however that the MET have some vicious sods in their ranks and violence against the public is more common than it should be.
Would a young man egged on by his mates to lash out at a stranger, leading to his victims death get same level of sympathy TJ?
Front line cops have got to be responsible for their acts of unwarranted violence just as much as the rest of socioty. Sometimes "training, briefing and management" can be the scapegoat to excuse out of control front line thugs.
You can train someone as much as you like but if he/she is prepared to run up behind and assault a person walking away and not presenting a threat to you or the public then he/she deserves to be placed in a court to answer their actions. Try it yourself, run up behind someone, hit them with a baton, push them to the floor and see where you end up.
Teh point I try to make is that by hanging the individual out to dry its hard to actually get to the roots of what happened as both the individual and the service will close ranks to try to protect him. thi is only natural.
We don't know the stress and strain that cop was under, we don't know what they had been briefed, we don't know if they were a suitable person to be in the police force.
I am only asking the questions here that need to be asked. Does the responsibility go far wider than the individual cop? I think it might well do
Is it more a case of "corporate manslaughter" by the Met? if the recruitment, training, briefing was up to scratch this ideath may not have happened?
We have had this happen too many times and the lessons are not beig learnt? Why not?
Yes there is a problem in the MET of thuggish behaviour. But what about individual responsibility?
I have no issue with the cop being charged if he has behaved outside his training and instruction and there is a realistic chance of a prosecution
i want to see the senior officers there alongside him to explain how he came to be there in that mood and took those actions
TJ is right
It's not just senior police though, where do they get their instructions from do you think?
The containment and actions in dispersing the climate camp have been deemed unlawful also.
All coppers should be ashamed to support a system that allows this to happen.
TJ, I agree with you on that. I suppose my assumption is that his official training would never sanction that behaviour. However custom and practice may be entirely different and this may be normal behaviour. Doesn't make it ok though.
Maybe its time he spoke out about tactics and instructions, you would have hoped a mans death would have been enough incentive for the people we give power and authority to, supposedly to protect us. Hundreds of cops would have known of the instructions and tactics that day, its quite horrendous to think not one of them has the decency to actually act in the best interest of the public and actually be honest.
yossarian, I think we may be about to get banned from STW. Isn't there something in the T&C's about not being allowed to agree with TJ? That's two agreements in the space of 5mins. We might break the Internet.
CHB - I am not sure he did act outside his training and instruction - you see - or not by a lot. Just his misfortune that Tomlinsons insides were like a rotten tomato ready to burst.
Its the desire to cover up that leads to such things as the Patel autopsy and the cop lying under oath - now if the individual feels safe they are not going to be hung out to dry if they are honest and have acted honestly then we have a much better chance of getting to the truth and preventing this happening again.
The PC had a Duty of Care to uphold on that day the same as you and i have to each other when we walk / drive/ cycle past each other in the street, i believe and i hope a jury agrees with me that he breached that duty of care.
That's why I said "assumed".
TJ whether his insides were like a rotton tomato is of no consequence, you take your victim as you find them in law.
Aye but any other man in that crowd would not have died
Breached his duty of care - negligence? wasn't careful enough when he pushed him away? Seems reasonable. Not going down for that tho
How do you know?
For all I know I may have a undiagnosed heart problem. Can't tell til you push me over and I die.
They may have banged their head and suffered a bleed, the PCs blow may have fractured a rib leading to a punctured lung we dont know, but the question to answer is why the PC felt his actions were justified and as a man died as a result of those actions a courtroom would seem a fair place to discuss it.
It has been decided the Ian Tomlinson was unlawfully killed.
What should now be decided (at trial) is whether Harwood is criminally responsible.(IMO he most certainly is). To gain a conviction the prosecution need to prove intent to cause harm or recklessness (as to whether harm would be done). Negligence would not come into it.
Its not like the met havent done this kind of thing before and got away with it. Blair Peach.
1. the defendant owed a duty to the deceased to take care;
2. the defendant breached this duty;
3. the breach caused the death of the deceased; and
4. the defendant's negligence was gross, that is, it showed such a disregard for the life and safety of others as to amount to a crime and deserve punishment.
Negligenge is not criminal (although there are certain exeptions).
His actions would be fairly easy to prove criminal IMO. Manslaughter should be the charge he faces.
Harwood had attacked 5 people, including a BBC cameraman, in the 8 minutes before attacking Tomlinson. However I can't see the DPP making a case against him since he was only doing his job.
TandemJeremy - MemberWe don't know the stress and strain that cop was under,
But we do know he chose to be where he was, rather than where he was supposed to be, and that when asked to explain that he lied as to his reasons.
Saw an interview with a BBC cameraman who was filming a protester being hit with a baton. He was grabbed from behind and thrown to the floor by this same officer, CCTV footage showed it also.
Sounds like he lost control after 14 hours in the midst of the protest (and probably a lot of provocation); some body died and now he has to live with that.
Anyone who has had the misfortune to encounter the TSG or any other incarnation of these bully boy outfits will know that they are never far away from this kind of tragedy.At least this time there antics were caught on CCTV and he even had his numbers on.
I am in agreement with the decision we can debate the copper when he faces charges
Sounds like he lost control after 14 hours in the midst of the protest (and probably a lot of provocation); some body died and now he has to live with that.
He hasn't shown any remorse or told the truth, so he seems to have been living with his actions quite comfortably, hopefully that will now change.
Well I also agree with much of what TJ has said.
I don't think any of us understand what these cops have to deal with during these protests (I'm not defending what happened in this case with this statement as I'm sure there are cops looking for a ood fight as well). There are some pretty nasty manipulative people on the other side of the protest as well who abuse the right to protest (IMO). I bet it's a wee bit diffiuclt in the heat of the moment to decide what sort of person you have facing you. I also bet quite a few normal people caught up in the protests can (understandably) get a bit bolshie with the police as well.
This particular cop may well have been out of order but I do think we need to have a very hard long think about the balance between freedom of speech, impact on local people in the vicinity and the cost of policing the demonstrations. I don't have the answers but I don't think the status quo is sustainable, there are many people out there abusing the right to protest because it makes them feel big rather than for any legitmate hope of changing something. There's plenty of ways to protest that don't involve shutting down and destroying a city centre. Some of them even work.
MSP - the way the system is now he cannot admit guilt or show remorse or he is in peril of prosecution. He has to claim he did not wrong. He cannot say
" I was tired and fed up, my boss had told me to be ruthless, I had beentrained to push people and I over reacted in the heat of the momnet"
I don't have the answers but I don't think the status quo is sustainable, there are many people out there abusing the right to protest because it makes them feel big rather than for any legitmate hope of changing something. There's plenty of ways to protest that don't involve shutting down and destroying a city centre. Some of them even work.
Well put.
It might be well put, but it is factually incorrect - no city centre was 'destroyed'. The biggest problems occurred in connection to the tactics used by the police.
[i]In the days leading up to the summit, the Metropolitan police warned protest groups that the protests on April 1 would be "very violent" and that they were "up for it, and up to it" in the event of trouble.
The police used the crowd-control tactic known as containment or the “kettle”, to hold 5,000 people inside a police cordon without food, drink or lavatory facilities. This combined with riot police pushing into crowds with shields and batons. [/i]
The Met police had decided [u]before[/u] the event that there would be trouble. As we now know, by far the most violent party during the protests was the Met Police themselves. Indeed according to the Daily Mail:
[i]"The Metropolitan Police said just one arrest - for drunk and disorderly - had been recorded by 4.40pm. Police estimated the crowds at around 35,000".[/i]
[url= http://www.****/news/article-1165382/35-000-protesters-turn-G20-march-London---police-arrest-just-one.html ]35,000 protesters turn out for G20 march in London ... but police arrest just one[/url]
And yet the police had kettled thousands of people and attacked them with batons and shields.
As TJ suggests, the senior officers who had promised that the protest would be "very violent" and had hyped up their men with macho talk about being "up for it" should be held accountable when the unsurprising consequence is that an innocent person dies. Senior officers get extremely high salaries and expect to take the credit when things go right, they should be forced to carry the can when things go wrong. I can't see how anyone can argue against that.
I bet it's a wee bit diffiuclt in the heat of the moment to decide what sort of person you have facing you.
Ian Tomlinson was walking away from his killer, posing absolutely no threat whatsoever, when he was pushed over.
Not that difficult to work out that a man walking away from you with his hands in his pockets isn't actually posing any real threat, is it?
Let the killer face the same justice as anyone else.
There are some pretty nasty manipulative people on the other side of the protest as well who abuse the right to protest (IMO)
Yep.
Not that difficult to work out that a man walking away from you with his hands in his pockets isn't actually posing any real threat, is it?
I dunno, I've never been a cop at a demonstration.
Not defending the officer but have you never ever lost your temper?
It's not about 'losing your temper'.
Was this the only reported assault by the police that day?
Take a spin around the Internet. Watch the videos of how the climate change camp was attacked, watch protesters sitting on the floor chanting 'this is not a riot' and still getting struck by batons and shields. Read the articles about how the containment has been ruled as unlawful.
Etc
The grunts on the ground act on orders received. Senior police officers (especially the met) do as they are told by Whitehall.
Remember that Obama was on town at the G20? The police were undoubtedly told to snuff out trouble to avoid a PR disaster. Their actions were unlawful. That's it really.
What I mean (and should've said it in the first instance) is have you ever lost it only to find the consequences way worse than they should've been? He, the officer, lost it completely, the victim was unlucky to bear the grunt of being "the chosen one". [u]The attacker[/u], as that's who he is here - not the copper, [u]should go down[/u] but the big result should be mental and psychological scanning of the force.
I'm not sure he did lose it though. Having watched the footage a number of times it looks like the officer was acting aggressively for sure but it didn't look uncontrolled to me.