i just finished my essay and i came out
to celebrate i wanted to go out and grab
something to eat
i bumped into an old friend of mine so i
got into the back of his car and
we just started chatting he wanted to
pick up some money from
the cash machine and the next thing
i've been dragged out of the car by a
police officer
i'm scared and i'm in shock
i'm really trying to gather my thoughts
as to what have i done
to deserve this why am i being
dehumanized like this
my vision is blurring shapes are
becoming like different
colors i just remember things turning
like they looked a bit radioactive to me
because i
couldn't i knew that i was losing
consciousness
and i had to beg to god that this will
not be the last place
this will not be the last place that my
father will hear about me
he cannot be watching me and seeing this
and seeing that these will be the last
words of his daughter
[Music]
on the 9th of may this year during the
national lockdown
a police traffic stop in south east
london led to this
[Music]
black people saying she can't breathe
this student in her early twenties was
caught up in an incident in which the
man she was with was pulled over by the
police for driving erratically
he was arrested and later convicted of
drunk driving
she has asked that we protect her
identity
our understanding is that four officers
from the metropolitan police
admit punching her three repeatedly and
one officer also admits
kicking her the police say she was
resisting being handcuffed and searched
as a female civilian to have six
seven eight officers on you this has
happened to somebody else and it took
just
one person it took just one person to
take their life
with use of force by police towards
black people under scrutiny worldwide
these scenes raise further questions
having a male officer using all his body
weight
burying his knee into my neck and using
all the power within him to try to cut
off my air supply
i remember asking the female officer who
punched me several times i told her i
was like
that male officer my exact words were
like he's killing me
and i remember seeing a smirk on her
face and her exact response was that
if you can talk you can breathe
at this point i know that these people
are not here to help me and
my question is how am i going to get out
of this situation
alive and unharmed
they then picked me up with my hair like
with my braids which
they eventually tore out from my scalp
because of my body weight
[Music]
this arrest was officially recorded by
the police as a use of false incident
defined as anything from handcuffing at
one end of the spectrum
through various types of restraint use
of police dogs
batons incapacitant spray hitting or
striking
right through to taser and firearms
while use of force incidents are common
the level of force
used during this arrest and the number
of officers applying it
is unusual
it's significant that this incident
happened in may
when the whole country was in full
lockdown
a time one might expect the deployment
of force by the police towards the
general public would be less
prevalent in fact figures show just the
opposite
there was a rise in use of force during
this period
newsnite has obtained use of forced data
from 37
out of the 44 police forces in england
wales and northern ireland
during the lockdown months of april and
may 27 out of the 37 police
forces saw a rising use of force
compared to the same months last year
the metropolitan police which is the
biggest police force in the country saw
a rise of 26
greater matches to 40 percent
gloucestershire 67
cleveland 64 derbyshire 38
the police say this is because calls to
them and demand went down
in the lockdown period crime has fallen
during the
the lockdown period and because of that
falling crime
kovid has provided time and space
for the police to undertake more
proactive policing operations
particularly around drugs and
particularly around county lines
activity
and if you do proactive operations of
that kind you'll end up doing a lot more
enforcement making a lot more
arrests and in particular in london
doing a lot of stop and search
and and that's why i think the use of
force has increased over this period
the national police chief's council
agrees an
uptick in proactive policing saw a rise
in use of force
which includes handcuffing and restraint
tactics
they said the rise was due also to
a notable increase in assaults against
emergency services workers
since the beginning of the pandemic they
added that force was rarely
used but where it was most forms of
restraint involved the use of handcuffs
home office figures in england and wales
show that black people are
disproportionately
impacted by use of force they're
approximately six
times more likely to be subjected to
force than white people
this disparity does not apply to other
ethnic minorities
there is disproportionality i don't
think there's any no one would deny that
the police themselves wouldn't deny that
the key question is what is the cause of
that disproportionality
and there's a number of potential
reasons for it one might be that there's
bias on behalf of police officers in a
in a minority of cases i think a very
small minority of cases it may be you
know
racism for example um in any
organization there'll be people who have
racist views
and the police would be no different but
i think that would be a very small
minority
the other potential explanation is that
the police focus on particular types of
crime
and they focus on particular areas when
they're doing this kind of enforcement
activity
and there are there will be more young
black people for example on the street
in those areas
the level of force used against this
black woman
undoubtedly raises serious questions
as does what she says happened to her
while she was in custody here
at lewisham police station they didn't
even tell me they were going to strip
search me
it literally just happened when in the
presence of the male
and the female officers with my cell
door wide
open so people were passing they cut my
jeans
they cut my underwear they cut my bra
why would you want to cut my bra i
thought this was just
them trying to humiliate me more to
dehumanize me even more
even though i had offered several times
to take off my clothes they literally
stripped me naked and the same officer
that had had his knee
buried into my neck came back while i
was fully unclothed
and there were other male officers
holding parts of my body
male officers should not be present in
the strip search of a woman
what happened during this strip search
is against regulations
a recent stomach operation meant that
she was worried about the pressure
applied to her by the police holding her
down
and she says that this was why she
resisted
i was pinned down again i'll say about
five
six seven officers i couldn't breathe
i kept begging them to stop it was the
same officer that was
punching me outside of the restaurant
who still went on to punch me while i
was fully unclothed and restrained for
no justifiable reason
she just hit me about i say maybe
eight times how hard did she punch you
very very hard very very
very very hard there was a lot of
intensity in her
and i don't know why
the initial allegations against her of
assaulting a police officer and
possession of cannabis have been dropped
as has the charge of obstructing a drug
search the police have not apologized
for the way she was treated
her experience has changed her
perception of the police
i'm scared of the police and i shouldn't
be
but it's my natural reaction now do you
think it's a case that these were just
a few bad officers or do you think there
is actually
institutional racism in the met
both i feel like there's
definitely institutional racism
you know there's good and bad people
everywhere you can't just
sweep a few bad apples under the rug
it's a representation of
everyone the met police has to have a
total reform
on these sorts of cases and people of
color because
it's increasingly obvious
that there is a problem there
the metropolitan police told us that
eight officers involved in these
incidents
are being investigated by the
independent office for police conduct
two of the officers have been placed on
restricted duties
pending investigation the probe will
rule whether officers acted within the
bounds of acceptable use of force or
beyond
and looking to their conduct of the
strip search
beyond this case the rising use of force
incidents during lockdown
tells a story of its own as questions
over race relations and policing persist
some are asking what can be done to
prevent some communities being unfairly
targeted
caroline tariff with that report and in
response to our story
the metropolitan police told us all
police officers are fully aware that
they'll be asked to account for their
actions
and the mec continues to cooperate with
the iopc's investigation team to ensure
that all the facts are established
eight officers are under investigation
in relation to this incident
two of whom have been placed on
restricted duties
the iopc said use of force is an
essential policing tool
like all police powers must be used
properly
proportionately and responsibly
examining the circumstances of the
woman's arrest
and the use of force on her our
investigation is also looking at the
woman's subsequent treatment
in custody they added to uphold public
confidence in the police complaint
system
were investigating the use of stop and
search tactics in this incident
and whether the actions of those
officers were appropriate and
proportionate
and followed approved police policies
we're also investigating if racial
profiling or discrimination played a
part in the incident
with regards to the rise of use of force
the home office told us we're clear that
all
use of force must be reasonable
proportionate and necessary
no one should be subject to it based on
their race
or ethnicity