Two students who won damages for being wrongly charged with assault at a tuition fees protest have accused the Met of allowing officers to act with “impunity”, after the constables involved escaped disciplinary action.
Ashok Kumar and Simon Behrman were wrestled to the ground, arrested, strip-searched, fingerprinted and charged with offences that could have damaged their careers.
But the charges were thrown out in court when YouTube video and photos showed that officers’ descriptions of the incidents, at the School of Oriental and African Studies in Bloomsbury, were inaccurate.
The judge in Mr Behrman’s case said the police’s version of events was “blown out of the water”.
The case against Mr Kumar collapsed after footage disproving Met testimony was found days before his trial.
Scotland Yard admitted to “inconsistencies” in the police accounts and launched a disciplinary investigation. But it has decided not to take further action. Oxford University student Mr Kumar, 29, said: “This was a clear-cut case. I was accused of assault, which could have cost me very dearly, but the judge and prosecutor realised the police didn’t have a leg to stand on.
“They paid £20,000 to settle the case. When they said that it would be a Directorate of Professional Standards investigation I was quite hopeful, but the outcome has only reinforced my belief that there is impunity for the police.”
The cases went before Highbury magistrates after the June 2011 protest. Police claimed Mr Kumar twice pushed one officer and blocked an attempt to stop a protester pushing a camera in another constable’s face. Pc Chris Johnson testified that Mr Behrman, who was doing a law PhD at Birkbeck College, had been violent and had struggled with a security guard. But a photographer’s pictures vindicated him.
Mr Behrman’s legal papers alleged that he fell when Pc Johnson grabbed his rucksack and protesters surged for-ward, then he was punched in the chest by another Pc before a third put him in a headlock. The Met said two officers had been given “words of advice about their future performance”, but an internal investigation concluded there should be no formal disciplinary action. There was “no case to answer” in respect of three other officers.
Debaleena Dasgupta, a solicitor for Birnberg Peirce which represented the students, said the Met’s failure to take action was “ridiculous”.
