Not a million miles from jingsamichty's "could be considered not unreasonable". In short, no one seems to be prepared to say that this is a proper way for a policeman to behave. Some will make concessions because of his job, effectively holding him to a lower standard of behaviour than applies to the public at large.

Obviously I don't think men should beat women with sticks except in the most extreme circumstances and that neither being verbal irksome nor being oppressively close physically constitutes an extreme circumstance. I think the orange juice defence might work against him; I find it difficult to think of a manner in which someone could be genuinely threatening while consuming a soft drink.

I think he might have arrested her without delivering the beating though I concede that it's hard to tell since we can't see the mob, if any, behind her.

A copper hitting a shrieking hippy....

As Oscar Wilde might have said, "the unspeakable chasing the inedible."

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So what was this "situation" that made his actions reasonable?

He was an officer on duty at a rowdy protest, some shouting and confrontation is surely to be expected, and its certainly not illegal.

Even as a five year old I was familiar with "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me", and it seems this guy is too, hence the rather improbable "orange juice" threat defence I guess.

I still completely fail to see how that was regarded as sufficent danger to warrant his action, but I guess time will tell. The UK courts never fail to surprise me in the application of justice.

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Where is is stated that she complained?

Yes, it does. If I did that to somebody then I would get done for assault.

The defenders on this board will probably say coppers should be held to a higher standard than the general public because of the power they have (in fact I think rae even said this). They then go on to describe how they should actually be held to a lower standard (as dbd said) because their job is difficult and frustrating - well get another job then as beating young girls half your size with a truncheon is not the behaviour of hard case no-nonsense coppers.

How do you define an assault?

Do you agree that police officers driving cars at high speeds should not be held to account if they run someone over, after all, aren't they just doing their jobs in that instance as well?

Should I be allowed to hit a police officer with a stick that if I feel threatened by him?

Look at the video - after the cop had cuffed her, she ran back remonstrating and pointing out that he'd just hit a woman, the fascist pig-dog.

I don't think that equates to going down the cop shop and pressing charges now does it.

OK. I meant in the prosecution sense.

You obviously think it is OK for men to hit women, I don't.

As a lawyer, I'm sure you know that it's not what you meant that matters, it's what you said.

You like leaping to conclusions, don't you? First, I was be "saying it's OK to shoot Brazilians on the Tube", and now "I obviously think it's OK for men to hit women."

That, my friend, would be a most interesting test case. I'm sure there are more than a few squats in Brighton eagerly awaiting the verdict in this case.

I am not acting as a lawyer here, I am posting on the internet. Fair enough, I sincerely apologise for any confusion I caused.


Use of excessive force by the police was the point I was trying to make. Once again, I apologise if you do believe it was wrong for a person with an authority and size advantage over a woman such that most people would assume the latter posed no real threat to the former to commit an assault.

Your reference to live by the sword, die by the sword, led me to this conclusion. So tell me then, did he do wrong by hitting her?

She is an adult isn't she?
What has gender got to do with it?
Size inequality doesn't mean that the larger person can't perceive a threat from a smaller person