Police justify assault on handcuffed teenager

 A WOMAN who witnessed a brutal assault on a teenager was shocked when the police Professional Standards Unit ignored her, dismissed the victim’s complaints and justified the attacked a “proportionate”.

Anna Larkin was at her kitchen window filling up a hot water bottle shortly after midnight on 1st November last year when she says she saw two plain-clothed officers assault Agnelito Da Costa, aged 18, as he and a friend made their way home in full face paint after celebrating Halloween at an East London pub.

Larkin, who is a communications officer for a prestigious art institution in Angel, North London, said she was horrified as she watched one of the officers push handcuffed Da Costa’s face into the bonnet of a car and hold it there while a colleague kicked his legs away so he fell to his knees, kicked his legs apart, kicked him hard between the legs and stamped on his ankles.

But Da Costa and his friend, Matthieu Dufour, who works as a graphic designer in Shoreditch, were quickly released after Larkin’s camera began flashing as she took pictures of the scene on the corner of Mare Street and Westgate Street in Hackney moments after the alleged attack.

While Larkin’s account corroborates that of Da Costa’s and Dufour’s, who were all interviewed separately, Hackney’s Police Professional Standards Unit (PSU) did not acknowledge or deny her account, but admitted force was used saying it was justified in the interests of officer safety after the teenager became aggressive.

Responding to Anne Larkin’s complaint, PSU investigator Mark Simkins, who also works as a Special (volunteer officer), wrote: “[the officers] fully justify their use of force against the subject involved. … One male was fully compliant and the other was not. Whilst we do not expect every member of the public to bend over backwards for us we do not expect acts [of] aggression from the very outset. The two original officers who stopped the male in question were faced with just that.”

Da Costa admits he was verbally aggressive, but only after the police nearly ran him over and put him in cuffs. He said an unmarked car had driven past with the occupants looking at them as he and Dufour walked along Mare Street towards Hackney Town Hall when moments later it pulled up in front of them.

Two officers jumped out and handcuffed his friend. As he crossed the road an unmarked car drove at him almost knocking him over, he said. “I thought I was going to be run over. [The driver] came out of the car and I went up to him and said what are you doing … and he went straight to the conversation asking me what are you doing here, where are you heading? ”

Before he answered, Da Costa said he was handcuffed and threatened with arrest unless he gave his name and address. He continued: “I said I’m not going to give it to you and I was screaming at the officers because I was really angry because I was literally just handcuffed for no reason, but after a few minutes I decided to give them my name because I didn’t want to be arrested.” Da Costa said he then questioned why he had been stopped and cuffed when the assault occurred.

Simkins pointed out to Larkin that she had not seen Da Costa’s “aggressive” behaviour and was unaware of the potential risk the officers were facing.

Larkin admitted she did not see the point at which the pair were stopped and cuffed or Da Costa remonstrating with the officers, but said the arts student was handcuffed at the time of the “assault” so posed no threat.

In a letter to Simkins complaining of the “flimsy” investigation, Larkin wrote: “Whether or not the young man was initially fully compliant, the incident I witnessed occurred when he was fully incapacitated. … I find it incredible that you believe the subsequent kicking and stamping was a reasonable and necessary course of action following the officers’ risk assessment. What possible risk could the young man pose on his knees, handcuffed from behind and his face being held down on the bonnet of the car?”

Larkin and Da Costa also complained of the officers laughing at him when he asked for their identification numbers, which they are obliged to give during a stop, after being released.

Da Costa, who also sings in a band with Dufour, said: “They were just messing around literally just laughing saying I’m not going to give you my number. I asked them a few times. … One of the officers decided to make a joke. … They were just saying random long numbers … and every officer was just laughing.”

End bedroom tax madness

Protest in London

             by New Worker correspondent 

THOUSANDS of protesters turned out in freezing cold in all major cities throughout Britain last Saturday to show opposition to the iniquitous bedroom tax, which came into force on Monday.

Many are predicting it will become as disastrous to the Cameron government as the poll tax was for Margaret Thatcher.

Many of the protesters were directly affected and spoke movingly of their desperation at being unable to move to smaller accommodation in order to avoid having their housing benefit cut for the sin of being deemed to have a spare room – and yet totally unable to meet the steep rise in the rent they must pay.

The spectre of eviction now haunts many families but they are not going to go quietly.

Two thirds of those affected have a disabled family member who needs a specially adapted room or cannot share with siblings.

In London protesters matched from Trafalgar Square to Downing Street, where they staged a two-hour sit down, blocking traffic in Whitehall.

 They were supported by Unite the union and the Occupy movement.

All speakers agreed the tax made no economic sense at all but was simply evidence of spite and cruelty against the poor and the disabled.

The Government came under new fire over benefit cuts last night as the independent body representing 1,200 English housing associations described the bedroom tax as bad policy and bad economics that risks pushing up the £23 billion annual housing benefit bill.

There are a growing number of instances of tenants who have sought to move to smaller accommodation. For most no such alternative homes are available.

But for the few who have managed to get a smaller place, it has generally involved moving from council or housing association accommodation to the private sector, where rents are many times higher and so their need for housing benefit has risen markedly.

David Orr, chief executive of the National Housing Federation, said the tax would harm the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. It came into force this week alongside a range of other tax and benefit changes.

"The bedroom tax is one of these once-in-a-generation decisions that is wrong in every respect," he said. "It's bad policy, it's bad economics, it's bad for hundreds of thousands of ordinary people whose lives will be made difficult for no benefit – and I think it's about to become profoundly bad politics."

The tax will hit 660,000 households with each losing an estimated average of £14 a week.

Unite pledged that its members and community activists would continue the protests in the coming weeks against the “tax” whose architect is the work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith.

Unite general secretary Len McCluskey said: “The inconvenient truth that Iain Duncan Smith is avoiding is that 650,000 families across the UK are suffering sleepless nights because of this government’s ill-conceived plans to drive them from their homes and push them deeper into financial misery.

“This is Tory-led social engineering on a massive scale.”

Sussex students fight outsourcing

by New Worker correspondent

HUNDREDS of students from the University of Sussex descended on London’s Strand last Wednesday to support comrades inside the Law Courts fighting the eviction of a student sit-in.

The university authorities were seeking an injunction against all on-campus protests until September during a mighty battle against plans to outsource many university services.

The High Court has ruled that protesters should be evicted from part of the University of Sussex. On Thursday the university was granted a possession order to regain the area of Bramber House occupied by the protesters since 7th February.

A spokesperson for the protesters said: "It's a sad, sad day for higher education and there will be nowhere we can legally protest at the university."

The injunction is a response to student and staff protests as well as an ongoing occupation demanding that the university not outsource 235 facility-maintenance and catering jobs (10 per cent of its total workforce).

Baluchistan separatists speak out

 by New Worker correspondent

A GROUP of Baluchistan separatists demonstrated in Whitehall last Saturday calling for British government support for their demand for independence from Pakistan.

Issues range from human rights abuses, greater autonomy, increased royalties from natural resources and provincial revenue.

Shortly after Pakistan's creation in 1947, the Pakistan Army had to subdue insurgents based in Kalat who rejected the King of Kalat's decision to accede to Pakistan. This has led to a continuing conflict with Baluchi nationalist and tribal movements fighting for autonomy or outright independence while Pakistan claims that the militants are being funded by Indian intelligence.

Baluchistan is one of Pakistan’s poorest regions although it has vast natural resources. Baluchi separatists allege that the central government of Pakistan is systematically suppressing development in Baluchistan to keep the Baluchis weak.

In the period from 2003-2012, it is estimated that 14,000 Baluchis were kidnapped by Pakistani security forces in the province.

Bahraini protesters ‘shouting in the dark’

by New Worker correspondent

A LARGE group of Bahraini fighters for democracy and human rights staged a protest rally in Whitehall opposite Downing Street last Saturday to draw attention to the plight of democrats in Bahrain and to protest at David Cameron’s continued friendly relations with the ruling King  Hamad Bin Isa al Kalifa.

Their rebellion began two years ago with the “Arab Spring” but failed to gain much attention in the western media.

            In February 2011 a mass rally in the capital called for the removal of King  Hamad Bin Isa al Kalifa. The king promised democratic and humanitarian reforms but these have not materialised.

One of the demonstrators in London on Saturday told the New Worker that the story of their struggle is told in a film on YouTube entitled Bahrain, shouting in the dark, made by Al Jazeera.

They say they are shouting in the dark because no one in the world is reporting their situation.

“This is the Arab revolution that was abandoned by the Arabs, forsaken by the West and forgotten by the world,” they say.

The demonstration coincided with the sit-down by the bedroom tax protest outside Downing Street. The Bahraini spokesperson with a megaphone began calling out: “Cameron does not care about the poor people in Britain or the poor people in Bahrain.”

Soon both crowds of protesters were shouting their anger with Cameron and the Con-Dem government in unison.

New Worker delays

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