PC Harwood managed to avoid one disciplinary charge by resigning from the Met force on health grounds, then rejoining two days later as a civilian employee. (Sky)
* Mark Pack is Party President and is the editor of Liberal Democrat Newswire.
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32 Comments
It seems the most odd decision given that we watched him strike the man for doing nothing.
I appreciate that the jury was not allowed to know that he is a violent thug with dozens of complaints about him including trying to fix records and beating people, but even at that. They surely saw the video footage; footage which, if I recall, was instrumental in making him alter his story, when it came to light.
One has to wonder what the jury was thinking about. Their own safety maybe?
Given recent reports about how corrupt the Met is, I wouldn’t wonder.
This, though, is the wrong moment to stir up public anger in London.
The family’s lawyers have apparently established that PC Harwood has been the subject of 10 complaints in the last 12 years. These included allegations of excessive force, violence and misuse of police resources. The judge ruled this evidence inadmissable.
The coroners’s jury brought in a verdict of unlawful killing. Whodunnit then? Obviously the guy who tried to help him up after he’d been assaulted –
As much as I agree this guy is a thug who seems to get off on abuse of power, I completely support the witholding of his previous behaviour – surely that is a fundamental liberal principle, that guilt or innocence should be judged on the basis of what happened in this particular incident not what he did on various earlier occasions that have nothing to do with this case.
To be honest, I think I would have had trouble voting “guilty” if I’d been on the jury. The medical evidence presented some doubt as to whether Ian Tomlinson died as a direct result of PC Harwood’s assault, and in any case the assault wasn’t severe enough that anyone could have anticipated it would be fatal, and it only had tragically fatal consequences because of the victim’s existing health condition.
I can’t understand why the prosecution didn’t include a lesser charge of assault along with manslaughter – that would surely have got a guilty verdict.
Mark’s quote about his resignation and immediate rehiring to avoid disciplinary charges is indeed incredible though. Not to mention that he was later rehired as a full constable not just a civilian employee. Let’s hope he gets permanently chucked out at his misconduct hearing…
Surely the senior police officers who massaged his career indiscretions should be held to account. It ought to be a simple process to find out who signed off the various transfers. How often does this happen? Seems unlikely to be a one-off occurence does it?
Absolutely agree with both Catherine and Keith Browning’s comments.
“in any case the assault wasn’t severe enough that anyone could have anticipated it would be fatal”
That is not necessary for manslaughter (even for murder it is sufficient if the intention was GBH and the result is death).
………………………………………………………One has to wonder what the jury was thinking about. Their own safety maybe?……………………
I was chairman of a jury in which police evidence was questionable. Two jurors stated , as their reason for accepting the evidence that “The police wouldn’t tell lies”. Such an ingrained “Dixon of Dock Green” view of the police is difficult to challenge.
@Catherine
“and in any case the assault wasn’t severe enough that anyone could have anticipated it would be fatal, and it only had tragically fatal consequences because of the victim’s existing health condition.”
That is the definition of manslaughter. If it was severe enough to be able to anticipate that it might be fatal then it would be murder.
“I can’t understand why the prosecution didn’t include a lesser charge of assault along with manslaughter – that would surely have got a guilty verdict.”
Because it’s not possible. Assault that leads to a death IS manslaughter, The jury at the inquest came to the conclusion that Tomlinson was unlawfully killed, which means that justice has not been served – one of the juries got it wrong. I know which one it was.
Do you seriously believe that Tomlinson would have died at the time he did even if he hadn’t been assaulted by Harwood? Astonishing.
Steve, don’t know enough about legal definitions to say for definite “you are wrong”, but my understanding of the definition of murder is that there was an intention to kill. I thought that manslaughter was brought in this case because there was too little evidence to say for definite that this was the case. I am surprised that the jury yesterday didn’t find guilty of manslaughter, but this raises the hoary old issue about whether we should be trying outcomes (ie death, in this case) or the serious negligence or actions that may have brought about the outcome, but perhaps resulted in a near miss.
The converse, obviously, is where, because of a medical condition etc, someone dies or is seriously injured when the other party has not carried out an action which should have led to that outcome (or that could have been anticipated).
If that is what the jury yesterday thought, then you can understand why the verdict was arrived at. Nevertheless, another charge (s) should have been brought – among others, abusing his power as a police officer, and whatever, he should end up with a lengthy sentence. And if there ARE any grounds, or any offences available, senior officers who negligently allowed him back on the streets should be prosecuted too.
I am unsure of your contention of linkage between outcomes in the inquest and the trial, also by the way.
@Tim13
Intent to kill isn’t necessary for murder (see malice aforethought at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder) : “unjustifiably high risk to human life” combined with the unlawful killing of another human being is sufficient. A definition of manslaughter is that the unlawful actions against another individual resulted in their death but that the same actions wouldn’t ordinarily be expected to have caused a similar person’s death (Harwood didn’t know about Tomlinson’s ill health). In the case of Harwood, if his actions were unlawful, resulted in Tomlinson’s death but would usually not be expected to result in the death of another individual, then it is manslughter. Logically, if Harwood unlawfully killed Tomlinson then he is also guilty of manslaughter, The decision of the jury in this case is beyond belief.
It looks like manslaughter. He deliberately acted to shove the unthreatening bystander to the floor. Anyone that has played a contact sport knows how dangerous it can be to shove someone from behind when they are not expecting it. This is not a new recruit, this is an experienced officer who was out of control.
While the prior record of this officer might not be relevant to this jury, its time to put the officers who gave this officer his second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth etc chances in the dock so they can explain why they put this accident waiting to happen back on our streets in uniform.
“he is a violent thug”
“this guy is a thug”
And numerous more subtle versions of the same sentiments.
I don’t wish to defend this man – I have no idea whether he was guilty in this case, or the previous ones. But whatever happened to the principle of innocent until proven guilty? And the idea that juries are the best way to reach a fair verdict? Can we just throw these principles out the window when we feel like it? He has never been convicted of an act of violence, and none of the complaints of violent behaviour made against him has ever been upheld by police investigators. In that sense, he’s as innocent (of violent acts) as anybody else.
The jury would have based their verdict on much more than an ultra-poor quality video.
“But whatever happened to the principle of innocent until proven guilty? And the idea that juries are the best way to reach a fair verdict? Can we just throw these principles out the window when we feel like it?”
This is a case where two juries have reached contradictory verdicts, though. The inquest jury found that Ian Tomlinson had been unlawfully killed, beyond reasonable doubt.
@ Steve
Yes, you’re right about the definition of manslaughter – I looked it up and involuntary manslaughter doesn’t require an assault serious enough that it would normally be expected to result in death (in which case it would be voluntary manslaughter or murder). I thought it was a more serious set of conditions, as @Tim13 says this brings up the uncomfortable question about how much bad/good luck should determine someone’s guilt or innocence.
But anyway, you’re correct that Harwood would be guilty of involuntary manslaughter if the jury was sure that his actions caused Tomlinson’s death, even if they wouldn’t normally be expected to be fatal. So presumably the jury weren’t sure beyond reasonable doubt that Tomlinson died as a direct result of the assault. The defence brought a medical expert to testify that death from internal bleeding would have been unlikely to occur so soon afterwards, so I guess the jury felt that was enough to constitute reasonable doubt.
I think the difference in verdicts between the inquest and the trial is a result of the difference in focus. The inquest jury were asked to determine what happened to Ian Tomlinson, whereas the trial jury had to determine the guilt or otherwise of PC Harwood. Essentially, the inquest jury was ruling on an event while the trial jury was judging a person, and in the knowledge that their verdict could send him to prison (while the inquest jury knew that the only consequence of their decision would be to put him on trial). Also, there is a lot more challenging and questioning of evidence in a trial than in an inquest, and different rules on the admissability of evidence.
In the process of checking up on that, I answered my own earlier question: the CPS said they couldn’t bring an assault charge because too much time had passed – a charge of assault must be brought within 6 months of the alleged crime.
We normally accept that a jury’s verdict is correct, by virtue simply of it being delivered by a jury. The CPS provides some useful guidance on manslaughter
https://www.libdemvoice.org/incredible-29505.html#comment-214759
Amnigst othet things it says: Involuntary manslaughter … occurs where a person kills, but does so without the intent to kill or cause GBH ….There are two types of involuntary manslaughter, namely:
that caused by the defendant’s gross negligence; and
that caused by his unlawful or dangerous act
The words all have rather specific definitions which the CPS website describes. Taking account of these legalities, it does look as if the jury’s deliberations might not have been as simple as one might imagine from the video.
Sorry, that should have been
http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/h_to_k/homicide_murder_and_manslaughter/#manslaughter
@Catherine
So it looks as if this is another case of the CPS poorly playing their hand, as it would seem that they throw away the opportunity to secure an assault conviction as they were (over?) hopeful of being able to secure a manslaughter conviction.
I wonder whether considerations of how the media might react to an assault charge swayed the CPS decision to go for the riskier manslaughter charge.
Shoving Tomlinson over appears likely to have caused his death. If however there was some reasonable doubt as to whether it did, i.e. that “The defence brought a medical expert to testify that death from internal bleeding would have been unlikely to occur so soon afterwards”, then to that extent, it is understandable that the manslaughter charge failed.
But before that, Tomlinson got a mighty thwack from a truncheon, which was totaly unprovoked and unreasonable. It didn’t kill him. You can bet it hurt. Why didn’t this quite separate incident attract an assault charge?
Roland, how about the possibility of bringing more than one charge? I don’t know what the rules are there, but it certainly happens sometimes. It seems to me that if it is fairly obvious someone has committed a crime, it is a bit of a lottery if you can only bring one charge at a time, and if the evidence isn’t quite strong enough to convict on a more serious charge, you lose the chance of the lesser charge. I know the law is an ass, but surely that’s one problem we can eliminate.”Innocent unless you bring the right charge within the right time frame” isn’t quite what common law had in mind, I don’t think!
They should have gone for an assault charge. The case would have been clear cut and the sentence would have taken in the coroners findings. A manslaughter charge was always more difficult, because of some doubts about the actual cause of death.
To criticise the verdict of a jury is not to attack the principle of trial by jury, or we wouldn’t be able to suggest Timothy Evans might have been wrongly convicted of his wife’s murder with a certain John Reginald Halliday Christie a key witness against him.
The evidence against Harwood was not just the video, but the evidence of other police officers who saw him do it . One can only issue a warning: do not allow your back to get within pushing distance of a police officer, or he will be entitled to use reasonable force to push you in the back without warning and if you fall down and die that’s your own fault.
@ Roland @ David Allen @ Tim13
Quite!
I read through the original CPS statement explaining why they (at first) decided not to bring any charges. I think on the manslaughter charge they were in a very difficult position because there was an irreconcilable difference of opinion between the doctor who did the first post-mortem and those that did the later ones. The CPS point out that in cases of disagreements between expert witnesses, the jury is very likely the err on the side of reasonable doubt (which is fair enough). So I think they knew a manslaughter charge would probably fail for this reason – and it seems they were proved right – but they were forced into prosecuting by the later inquest verdict.
However, I can’t find an explanation for why there was such a delay in the investigation that they missed the deadline for the assault charge.
I’ve pasted the passage about the baton strike / possibility of an assault charge below. The last sentence is the crucial one – why wasn’t it possible to bring any charge after 6 months? Was it, as Roland suggested, that they were holding out for manslaughter? If so, I don’t understand why they couldn’t bring the common assault charge first and then bring a manslaughter charge later if the evidence allowed. Unless perhaps there is some version of double jeopardy that doesn’t allow a defendant to be charged successive times over the same incident…
“The separate strike with the baton was also considered. It had left patterned bruising. But where injuries are relatively minor, as these were, the appropriate charge is common assault in accordance with the CPS Charging Standard, which is applied nationally. This Charging Standard was applied in another incident arising from the G20 where a police officer had struck the complainant twice with his baton.
Common assault does not require proof of injury, but it is subject to a strict six month time limit. That placed the CPS in a very difficult position because enquiries were continuing at the six month point and it would not have been possible to have brought any charge at that stage.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jul/22/cps-statement-death-ian-tomlinson
“The CPS point out that in cases of disagreements between expert witnesses, the jury is very likely the err on the side of reasonable doubt (which is fair enough).”
Surely it’s very common for expert witnesses to disagree. On that basis Crippen would have got off!
“To criticise the verdict of a jury is not to attack the principle of trial by jury”
Perhaps. But to declare a man guilty (as virtually everybody here is doing) when he has not been proven such is violating the most cherished legal principle we have.
This was a month-long trial, at the end of which the jury deliberated for four days. Criticising the decision of the jury, when we know next to nothing about what they heard in the trial and even less about what they discussed behind closed doors, is armchair judgmentalism of the worst kind.
Perhaps we should dispense with juries altogether and start convicting people by Twitter straw poll.
@catherine:
“The medical evidence presented some doubt as to whether Ian Tomlinson died as a direct result of PC Harwood’s assault, and in any case the assault wasn’t severe enough that anyone could have anticipated it would be fatal, and it only had tragically fatal consequences because of the victim’s existing health condition.”
Surely, this does not matter? The issue which matters is the degree of criminality and recklessness. The man performed an act which had no justification where it could be expected that a majority of victims of such action would be injured. It is difficult to believe that any competent police officer would not recognise that a proportion of victims of such action would be frail and hence likely to suffer serious injury or die in these circumstances.
@Catherine:
“where injuries are relatively minor, as these were, the appropriate charge is common assault in accordance with the CPS Charging Standard, which is applied nationally.”
Which OUGHT TO BE applied nationally, maybe. CPS are notoriously variable in quality – probably far more so than the police are, and their quality standards processes are a bigger laugh than Morecambe and Wise.
If I ran down a street and hit someone I didn’t know with a big stick for no reason and they subsequently dies, would I have been charged with ‘common assault’?
Stuart Mitchell
As I’ve already pointed out to you, two juries have considered this case. One acquitted Simon Harwood of manslaughter. But the other found a verdict of unlawful killing. The standard of proof in both cases was the same. There is a contradiction there, and a cause for concern. I think you should acknowledge that, rather than elevating yesterday’s verdict and ignoring the verdict of the coroner’s jury.
Actually the two juries ARE consistent. Unlawful killing includes murder, manslaughter, and other things including death by dangerous driving. The second jury says it was not mansalughter, at least not by Harwood, and it sure wasn’t driving. The only one left is murder. So, taken together, the verdicts seem to imply that Tomlinson was murdered.
… or that he had already sustained the fatal injury before being struck by Harwood. I’m no lawyer, but could his behaviour and autopsies be consistent with an earlier injury? And were these sorts of possibilities investigated?
This man had more excuse for what he did:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2176545/Pro-boxer-Clifton-Ty-Mitchell-jailed-seven-years-killing-Leeds-student-single-punch.html
Stuart Mitchell:
“……..to declare a man guilty (as virtually everybody here is doing) when he has not been proven such is violating the most cherished legal principle we have.”
No it is not. The right to disagree, openly and publicly, with the findings of a jury, taking into account the level of (or lack of) knowledge or certainty which an individual has on the issues concerned, is as cherished a UK right as is the right of each person to be tried by a jury.
Anyone who has spent more than five minutes in the UK criminal justice system knows how clearly and badly wrong it gets things, again and again. It’s just a pity we can’t find better ways of dealing with most of these things.
@Richard
All the questions you ask are crucial, and there will be dozens (maybe hundreds) more – all of which would have been considered during the month-long trial. I don’t think anybody has any credibility in saying the jury is wrong unless they too sat through that whole month’s worth of evidence and heard and saw everything the jury did.
Chris: Yes, the inquest verdict is very important, I don’t dispute that. But I don’t believe the two verdicts are directly comparable because one verdict had the potential to convict a man, the other did not. Plus the second trial may well have included evidence not available to the inquest.
Tony: “The man performed an act which had no justification where it could be expected that a majority of victims of such action would be injured.”
So are you suggesting that no police officer should ever be allowed to shove or hit a member of the public? Even riot police who are attempting to clear an area and come across somebody who is being obstructive? Please explain what alternative methods of clearing an area riot police could use if they’re not allowed to touch anybody.
It seems to me that there ought to be rules of engagement that police officers should be obliged to follow, and that it would be difficult to accept rules that would justify Tomlinson being either bitten or struck in this case.