There’s an old joke among railwaymen that the BTP are the rejects who couldn’t get a proper policing job, best left to police church fetes.
Personally, I never had any particular issues with them when I dealt with them during incidents when I was a first responder. However, there’s always one.
This is the dramatic moment a police officer pepper sprays a rail passenger after he resists arrest for refusing to wear a face mask on a train.
The shocking footage shows the clash between the passenger and the lone officer on a Wirral line service at Lime Street Station in Liverpool.
The video shows the officer telling the man to wear a mask, only for him to counter, saying he does not have to wear one due to a ‘medical condition’.
That is where the exchange should have ended along with a “thankyou sir, have a nice day.”
But no, this officer then tries to arrest a man (Anthony Baldwin) who is not breaking the law, pepper spraying him in the process. So we have unlawful arrest and violent assault. Given that we don’t know what medical condition Baldwin had, pepper spray in such circumstances was way, way out of order here.
Okay, so we only have this footage, but that is enough to warrant immediate suspension pending investigation and a disciplinary hearing. And if found guilty of the allegations, dismissal. This has no place in our policing. Beading in mind here, that if someone says they are mask exempt because they have a medical condition, they are under no obligation to expand upon the matter.
A spokesperson for British Transport Police said today: ‘A man has been charged with threatening behaviour and assaulting a police officer on a Merseyrail train to Liverpool Lime Street station.
‘The incident happened at around 3.20pm on Wednesday, September 2. Officers had responded to a report of a man coughing at two passengers.’
The man is due to appear in court in January 2021, the spokesperson added. The BTP said that while pepper spray was used during the incident, the man was not hit with the liquid.
We shall see, eh? He didn’t look threatening to me, more threatened by a thug in a uniform.
I am mask exempt. Unfortunately, this morning I experienced a coughing fit, resolved with my inhaler. But had I been out and about, would I have been reported to Plod for “coughing on people”?
The full video with sound is here:
The fellow passengers appear to be backing Anthony Baldwin here. So who made the accusation of coughing, I cannot say.
Hopefully, the case will get thrown out. It is time this mask nonsense was resisted anyway.
What kind of country has this become?
The ‘officer’ concerned should be charged with Criminal Assault and GBH. Possibly even attempted murder, although that would be a bit of a stretch.
I say that because using capsicum irritants anywhere near someone with any form of chronic bronchial condition is the act of a complete moron and probably criminal.
From the ‘science’; pepper spray “induces neurogenic inflammation in airway blood vessels, epithelium, glands, and smooth muscle, leading to vasodilation, increased vascular permeability, neutrophil chemotaxis, mucus secretion, and bronchoconstriction.” Which can prove fatal.
Another good reason to stay off public transport.
According to Baldwin, he is asthmatic.
A commentary by Ringo Star (or sound-alike) would be good.
Can anybody do Scouse? The accent not the scran.
A sort of melange of Thomas and Toy-Town.
This is but one of many reported BTP Mask Stasi disgusting episodes
Worse is Hancock’s 28 August law:
Read and weep
https://lockdownsceptics.org/2020/09/03/latest-news-123/#piers-corbyn-may-be-a-crank-but-his-treatment-should-worry-us-all
Hopefully he will have a pre diagnosed medical exemption in which case that Officer may also face charges relating to his victims Disability.
To be fair, a manager at my local mainline station told me that his BTP mate has issued just one mask related fine. That was because the individual spoke to the Officer “like a complete knob”.
The BTP apologists have been on Twitter insisting that the official DoH advice about not challenging people not wearing masks doesn’t apply to them, that they have to challenge in order to do their job.
But when questioned on what law allows this, and what medical training is required of BTP to enable this, they fall strangely silent.
I new some British Transport Police guys and they were mostly sensible people trying to do their best when dealing with some real low life scum, but as with real plod, because they deal with scum most of the time they think everybody is the same.
p.s. we used to refer to the BTP as ‘Be There, Possibly’.
Yeah, my experience is similar. However, this individual is a disgrace to his uniform.
Something wrtong wiht the video. Have Youtube pulled it?
Hmm. Looks that way.