An inquest jury concluded that officers used unsuitable and unnecessary force on Sean; failing to uphold his basic rights and spot the deterioration in his health as he collapsed after being restrained for eight minutes.
Jurors also found the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust culpable. Sean suffered from schizophrenia, but the Trust hadn’t ensured that he’d taken his medication. Nor had they conducted a mental health assessment. His care was inadequate and staff missed signs that Sean’s mental health was relapsing.
Sean was arrested that day after reports he’d attacked passers-by in Balham. Staff at his care home, worried about his behaviour, had called police previously but it took officers three hours to detain him.
A previously fit man, he died of cardiac arrest and partial positional asphyxia (the position officers held him in), amongst other conditions, soon after. The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) found that officers failed to even notice Sean was suffering from a mental illness.
Despite the findings, Sean’s
family are still seeking answers. They want to know how and why he was detained,
and what happened in the crucial minutes between him being bundled into a police
van and arriving at the station. They argue that the IPCC failed to properly
examine all the evidence in Sean’s case.
The United Families & Friends Campaign (UFFC) is a coalition of relatives and friends of those who’ve died in custody. Tomorrow, Sean’s family will join others in the Campaign’s 14th annual remembrance procession. They’ll march from Trafalgar Square to Downing Street, where they’ll present their demands to Prime Minister David Cameron.
Volunteers from Liberty will be there too tomorrow – as we were last Saturday, for the TUC march – to monitor the policing of the procession as independent witnesses. We’ll be there to observe and scrutinise the way the protest is policed.
Liberty remains firmly opposed to many police public order tactics. The right to peaceful protest is a fundamental democratic and human right; one Liberty was founded to promote. As we’ve done for decades, we’ll continue to provide legal observers for the policing of demonstrations such as tomorrow’s UFFC march – to ensure this vital freedom is protected.
- To find out more about Sean’s family’s campaign, visit: http://www.seanriggjusticeandchange.com
