Taser incident in Stevenage

Dear Hertfordshire Constabulary,

I refer to recent footage that has emerged of one your officers tasering a drunken old man in Stevenage.

Two officers are seen with the man who is face down on the ground. They have every chance to restrain him by hand.

Instead the large burly officer seems to find a drunken sleight old man too big a challenge to deal with. He backs away from the man and draws his taser. The drunken old man is of no serious threat to the officer or to the public, he raises his hands in the air. At this point the officer fires the taser at the drunken old man who is liable to fall onto hard concrete if the taser is used.

With the drunken old man incapacitated on the floor the big burly officer decides that a violent kick to the back is required which slams the drunken old mans head into the concrete. At this point there were at least 3 well built, young, non drunk officers at the scene.

In relation to this incident please could you provide the following information.

1. Do you consider the use of a taser in this incident to be lawful.
2. Do you consider the use of a taser in this incident to be in keeping with ACPO guidance
3. Has the officer faced any disciplinary action?
4. Please can you provide a copy of the 'use of force' form for this incident.
5. Was use of taser authorisation sought?
6. Was use of taser authorisation granted?
7. Do you consider the violent kick to the back to be lawful?

Yours faithfully,

Nigel Jones

Dear Hertfordshire Constabulary,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Hertfordshire Constabulary's handling of my FOI request 'Taser incident in Stevenage'.

You have provided no information as to why you have not provided the document requested at request 4 (use of force form). The use of force form, whilst it may be referred to during a misconduct hearing, is not a document that is related to misconduct hearings. It is merely a record of what occurred. Therefore i do not believe your use of 31(1)(g) by virtue of 31(2)(b) applies to this document. As all police staff must agree to the Code of Ethics (https://www.college.police.uk/ethics/cod...) which places obligations to be open and transparent to the public and to be accountable for their actions, i do not believe that any officer could reasonably expect that a factual record of their actions should be withheld from the public.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ta...
Your reference: FOI2021/06612

Yours faithfully,

Nigel Jones