Alleged use of excessive force - Suffolk Constabulary, April 2017

On 19 April 2017 a man was being driven to a doctors’ surgery by his father due to concerns about his mental health. During this car journey, the man left the vehicle while his father was still driving. The father phoned Suffolk Constabulary to report that his son was standing in the middle of a busy road and saying he felt suicidal.

In response to this telephone call, the police agreed to send out officers to assist. Prior to the police’s arrival, the father updated the police and informed them that his son had moved away from the road and was now sitting in a local park close by.

Three police officers arrived in the park. One of the officers took the man to the ground. The man subsequently complained of a painful hip and officers requested the attendance of an ambulance. Paramedics assessed the man and decided he should go to hospital. During this hospital visit, the man was informed that he had sustained a fracture to his hip.

Several weeks after the incident, the man raised a complaint against the officers involved, alleging that they had used excessive force against him when they detained him in the park.

As part of our investigation, the Lead Investigator interviewed the man about the incident. We also interviewed the three police officers who detained the man. They said that the man had made threats and that one of them had used approved force to take the man to the ground. No CCTV footage of the incident was available, nor were there any independent witnesses.

The only other person to have witnessed the event was the man’s father. He did not think that anything “untoward” had happened about the way his son was taken to the ground. He believed that his son may have fallen awkwardly on hard ground.

In their accounts, none of the police officers or the man’s father gave any indication that the man had appeared to be carrying an injury prior to his interaction with the police that day.

Although the man’s injury appears to have been caused when he was restrained by the police officer, the evidence available did not suggest that the use of force used by the officers was disproportionate in the circumstances.

The evidence collated by the investigation did not indicate that any officer may have committed a criminal offence or behaved in a manner which would justify the bringing of disciplinary proceedings.