I have no doubt that you will already be aware by now that Ian Tomlinson, who was simply walking home from work, not being disruptive, and not attacking the police or anyone else in any way whatsoever, and simply strolling along with his hands in his pockets was viciously shoved to the ground by a Metropolitan Police officer, and died of a heart attack a few minutes later.

A Metropolitan police officer appears to strike him with a baton, hitting him from behind on his upper thigh.

Moments later, the same policeman rushes forward and, using both hands, pushes Tomlinson in the back and sends him flying to the ground.

The Guardian

You can see the video for yourself.

The video goes on to state that “in a statement after his death, police initially said that protesters had impeded medics from treating Tomlinson”. They lied. Although if you see Indymedia’s photo of a police medic you might consider that keeping him away from anyone (whether already injured or not) might be better for their health. Paul Canning also provides some other witness statements contradicting the police story lies.

There are also suggestions that other footage exists which more clearly shows the officer striking the unarmed, innocent man with a baton (and that said footage with be shown at 7pm on Channel 4 news).

newsflash : We have new ITN exclusive video of Ian Tomlinson – shows police clearly striking out at him with a baton.Krishnan Guru-Murthy tweet (Channel 4 News presenter)

Yes, the Metropolitan Police lied about the protesters actions relating to a man whose death might very well have been caused by their actions. Nor did they seem to feel it was relevant that they the man who had died had been hurled to the ground and possibly struck by a police baton when he wasn’t doing anything wrong. No, they were too busy trying to cover their own backs.

Should we be surprised? No, they’ve lied before. It was of course illegal to take photos or videos of serving officers carrying out their duties, as if there wasn’t any evidence proving the police to be liars, people might take their word for it (indeed, many newspapers did).

Tim Ireland over at Bloggerheads has already talked about this (read it; tweet it; blog it; keep the message going), and he drew precisely the same parallel that I’m about to…

When the police murdered Jean Charles de Menezes (okay, that wasn’t the official verdict, but the jurors were not allowed by the coronor to return a verdict of unlawful killing, whatever their opinions may have been), the police initially said that he had run from the police.

Lie. He had walked to the tube station.

That he was wearing a bulky padded jacket, suitable for hiding a bomb.

Lie. He was wearing a light denim jacket, not suitable for hiding a bomb.

That he had suspiciously vaulted the barriers at the tube station.

Lie. He had used his pass to enter the barriers.

That they had shouted a warning.

Lie. None of the passengers on the train heard a warning. Only the firearms officers did, apparently. This is rather more worrying as it suggests to me that not only did the police lie about initially giving a warning, but they then lied again to the inquest, impugning the reliability of independent witnesses, in order to cover up the fact that they had shot and killed an entirely innocent man.

And the parallels here are striking.

Here, police omitted to mention that they had struck the man and hurled him to the ground. They lied and said protesters had impeded his medical treatment, which they had not.

These eyewitness statements make the point that the protester who provided the medical aid to Tomlinson which was lacking from his ‘protectors’ was “very brave” in the face of police charges.

Paul Canning

In other words, they lied again, to cover their own backs again.

The police are not, and can never be above the law. If a man who caused the death of another by punching him in a supermarket queue can be found guilty of manslaughter, then is being assaulted by a police officer any different? (Indeed, it seems up North, the police may actually be held to account — in Newcastle today a police officer has been found guilty of causing death by dangerous driving, despite claiming that he was driving ’safely’ at 94mph in a 30mph zone without lights or sirens)

It has also been announced today that the IPCC have requested a second post-mortem on Ian Tomlinson. I am not sure why — presumably they were seeking to determine that he was already ill. This is to miss the point. If I were to punch some guy with an existing heart condition, and he died, I would still be liable presumably at least for manslaughter, even if that condition was likely to kill him within a couple of years. The more important point is that the police should not be assaulting innocent citizens in the first place. Although the IPCC may have some other reason as yet unknown for wanting a second post-mortem…

The police tactics in managing the protest were abhorrent in themselves — the kettling tactics used to prevent perfectly legitimate protesters from leaving the protest are likely to ratchet up tensions, not defuse them. They make it impossible for protesters to leave, which could mean anyone with pre-existing medical conditions gets stuck behind a police cordon.

Not only that, there were reports of police taking photos of and asking the names of innocent demonstrators before they were allowed to leave. It seems that false imprisonment, harassment and threatening behaviour is seen as perfectly legitimate by the Metropolitan Police.

Now I know that some protestors were violent. But the whole point of having a police force is that they are supposed to be able to determine a difference between those people who are innocent, and those people who are guilty. Simply lashing out and attacking whoever is near you at the time is not ‘policing’, it’s, well… assault.

A police officer incapable of discriminating between criminals and innocent people (whether protesting or not) should be sacked. A police force incapable of doing this has failed it’s entire raison d’être, and should be replaced. Immediately, and before there are any more victims.

But more than anything else, the words of the Chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, have proved to me that the Met Police aren’t actually capable of policing.

“On a day like that, where there are some protesters who are quite clearly hell-bent on causing as much trouble as they can, there is inevitably going to be some physical confrontation. Sometimes it isn’t clear, as a police officer, who is a protester and who is not. I know it’s a generalisation but anybody in that part of the town at that time, the assumption would be that they are part of the protest.”Peter Smyth, quoted on BBC News

Peter here quite rightly identifies that some protesters were causing trouble. He then suggests that the police mis-identified Ian Tomlinson as a protester, and that’s why they struck him. What? Peter Smyth’s quote would lead me to believe that he thinks it is okay for the police to baton-strike any protester and hurl him to the ground, whether or not he is actually breaking the law. In the views of the Chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, protester = criminal, and striking Ian, had he been protesting, would have been perfectly legitimate.

That flagrant disregard for the rights of peaceful protesters sums up the Met’s actions.

Jean Charles de Menezes. Ian Tomlinson. That could have been you. That could have been your brother, your father, your friend. Next time it might very well be you or someone you care about, unless we take action to prevent a ‘next time’. Justice must be done, as opposed to the usual response of ‘covering up for police brutality’.

So I’d like to propose my solution.

1. Firstly, any member of any police force found to have lied about police action (or protester action) to be sacked. If this person can demonstrate that they were given incorrect information, then that will be a reasonable defence — provided they can identify who gave them that information, so they can be sacked.
2. Secondly, any member of any police force found to have used violence on an innocent (or violence otherwise inappropriate for the situation) to be charged with the appropriate criminal offense. Being a serving police officer is no defense; if anything this makes it worse as I think we have a right to expect higher standards from our police officers
3. Thirdly, kettling and similar tactics to be deemed illegal, and any police officer who recommends or allows such a tactic to be charged with “behaviour likely to incite a riot” (or whatever the nearest equivalent is) by the Crown Prosecution Service.
4. Fourth, the Metropolitan Police Service to be disbanded. They have proved, more than once, that we cannot trust what they say. They have proved, more than once, that they have caused the death of an innocent man. It’s no good simply replacing the man at the top: the entire root and branch of the organisation needs to be replaced. That isn’t to say every officer needs to automatically be replaced, but the existing command structure has proved not to work, and needs to be replaced. We need a police service in London, but we need a far better one than the Met.

Update: after a personal conversation and reading some comments elsewhere, I must make it explicitly clear I am not anti-police. Indeed at one stage in my life I considered joining the police force, and still think that ’serving the public good’ in this manner is a noble and frequently thankless task. However I expect anyone who does this to be even more law-abiding than everyone else, particularly when on duty, and to respect the rights of others. Even if — as was certainly the case at the G20 — missiles are being thrown, that does not give the police the right to lash out indiscriminately. I would expect those throwing missiles, those being violent, those committing vandalism to be specifically targetted by the police and arrested (with the minimum necessary force). I would expect those exercising their right to protest peacefully to be treated with the respect that the police would afford any other citizen that is not breaking the law. Failure to do this is a failure of policing.