|
The Crown Prosecution Service has decided to charge four Metropolitan Police Officers with assaulting a suspected terrorist. The officers, all from the Territorial Support Group, will face a charge of Actual Bodily Harm after they arrested Babar Ahmed in December 2003 - he suffered 70 separate injuries when they raided his home in Tooting. Todays decision came after an independent review by retired senior judge Sir Geoffrey Grigson into the handling of the case. Scotland Yard said they will consider putting the men on restrictive duty, Ahmed has demanded they be suspended baring the outcome of the court case. In 2004 the CPS decided there was insufficient evident to secure a conviction but Scotland Yard admitted Ahmed was mistreated and paid £60,000 in compensation. Ahmed then perused the matter in the civil courts. He alleged that officers beat him, dragged him up off the ground by his tesicals and forced him into a kneeling prayer positions jeering "where is your god now?" Today, Simon Clements, from the CPS, said there was "sufficient evidence" to charge four of the officers. Constables Nigel Cowley, John Donohue, Roderick James-Bowen and Mark Jones will appear at City of Westminster Magistrates' Court on 22 September. Babar is currently in prison in Worcestershire fighting extradition to America on terror charges, his case will be heard at the European Court of Human Rights - he has never been charged with a terror offence. His lawyer, Fiona Murphy said he was "pleased" the CPS decided to prosecute and that "a jury will now hear the evidence". He also wants Met Chief Constable Sir Paul Stephenson to confirm the officers are suspended from duty.
|
