Use of force on a man when being arrested - Metropolitan Police Service, February 2019

On Tuesday 5 February 2019, police were called to a pub in north London to reports of a man causing a disturbance. Two police officers arrived and identified the man. Body worn video from the officers shows one officer approaching the man, saying “you are detained” and trying to place handcuffs on him. There appears to be a struggle before the officer pushes his arm towards the man’s upper body, strikes him a number of times in the stomach area and tries to put him in a head lock. The other officer used his taser to ‘red dot’ the man. More police officers arrived, and force was used to arrest the man.

During our investigation, we conducted an appeal for witnesses and footage, obtained CCTV from the pub, reviewed body worn video from the officers in attendance, interviewed witnesses and interviewed the officers involved. The officer who struck the man was interviewed under criminal and misconduct caution.

We finished our investigation in July 2019.

We believed that the officer who struck the man had a case to answer for misconduct. We shared our report with the MPS who agreed and arranged a misconduct meeting.

The misconduct meeting held in January 2020 found the case proven and the officer was given a written warning for misconduct in relation to his use of force during the incident.