List of cases of police brutality

This list compiles incidents alleged or proved to be due to police brutality that attracted significant media or historical attention. Many cases are alleged to be of brutality; some cases are more than allegations, with official reports concluding that a crime was committed by police, with some criminal convictions for offences such as grievous bodily harm, planting evidence and wrongful arrest. This list should include only cases outside of the following countries, each of which has their own list:

Argentina  • Canada  • India  • Iran  • Pakistan  • United Kingdom

If you find a case from one of those countries on this list, please move it to the correct country list.

Before 1990

• 22 September 1920: In reprisal for an ambush by the IRA, Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) officers killed 5 civilians and burnt 16 houses/shops in west County Clare, Ireland.

• 21 November 1920: The Croke Park massacre in Dublin, Ireland. Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) officers opened-fire on civilians who were watching a Gaelic football match in Croke Park; 14 were killed and 60–70 wounded. The attack was believed to be revenge for an IRA assassination operation earlier in the day.

• 24 March 1922: The McMahon murders in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Officers of the Ulster Special Constabulary (USC) broke into a house owned by an Irish Catholic family and shot all eight males inside. Six were killed. It is believed to have been a reprisal for the IRA's killing of two policemen the day before.

• 1 April 1922: The Arnon Street killings in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Ten officers of the Ulster Special Constabulary (USC) broke into a number of Irish Catholic-owned homes and killed six Catholic civilians (including a child). This was believed to have been a reprisal for the IRA's killing of a policeman in the area.

• 21 March 1960. South African police shot at a crowd of black anti-apartheid protesters, killing 69 and injuring over 180 in what became known as the Sharpeville massacre. Evidence showed that the police continued firing even when the crowd had turned to run, and the majority of those killed and wounded were shot in the back. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission later concluded that the police actions had constituted "gross human rights violations in that excessive force was unnecessarily used to stop a gathering of unarmed people." (see Sharpeville massacre article for sourcing).

• 17 October 1961. The French police attacked a large demonstration of unarmed and peaceful protesters of Algerian origin, killing between 70 and 200 (numbers are uncertain, partly because many were drowned after being thrown into the Seine with their hands tied), in the Paris massacre of 1961.

• 19 April 1969 in Derry, Northern Ireland. During rioting between Irish nationalists and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), RUC officers broke into the home of Catholic civilian Samuel Devenny (42), who was not involved in the riots. The officers kicked Devenny and beat him ferociously with batons. His young daughter (who was recovering from surgery) and a family friend were beaten unconscious. His older daughter and son were also attacked. It is believed that the attack led to Devenny's death on 17 July 1969.^[1]

• 13 July 1969 in Dungiven, Northern Ireland. Catholic civilian Francis McCloskey (67) was beaten with batons by Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officers during street disturbances and died of his injuries the following day. He is sometimes deemed to be the first death of "The Troubles".^[2]

• 14–15 August 1969: During the 1969 Northern Ireland riots, the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) shot dead five Catholic civilians and opened-fire on crowds of Irish nationalist protesters.

• 1967–74: the methods of the Greek military junta were documented in the docudrama Your Neighbor's Son. It focused on the brutalization of young Military Police recruits which turned them into torturers. Michalis Petrou, a conscript who became a notorious torturer, testified against his former colleagues.^[3]

• 1977. Steve Biko is widely believed to have been killed by police as a result of anti-apartheid demonstrations in South Africa.^[4]

1990–1999

3 January 1998: Policemen from the North East Rand Dog Unit set their dogs on three Mozambican immigrants

• 3 January 1998: Six policemen from the North East Rand Dog Unit set their dogs on three suspected illegal immigrants, allowing the animals to attack the three men as the officers shouted racial insults. The incident was caught on video and televised nationally by the South African Broadcasting Corporation on 7 November 2000, causing widespread outrage. All six policemen were ultimately sentenced to jail terms of between four and five years each.^[5][6]

2000–2009

• 9 May 2001: police fired tear gas and plastic bullets into crowds at the Accra Sports Stadium, Ghana, causing a stampede in which 127 people died. It was Africa's worst sporting disaster. An official inquiry blamed police over-reaction,^[7] but prosecution failed to establish a case.
• 20–21 July 2001: Carlo Giuliani, protesting at the 27th G8 summit was shot dead by police in Genoa, Italy; the officer was tried, but acquitted on the grounds that he had acted in self-defence.^[8] 62 other protesters were hospitalized (including three comatose) after a brutal night-time raid on the Diaz school where they were sleeping. In a trial that concluded in 2010, twenty-five Italian police officers were convicted of grievous bodily harm, planting evidence and wrongful arrest.^[9]
• 25 September 2005: 18-year-old Italian student Federico Aldrovandi was killed after being beaten up during an arrest in Ferrara. The four officers involved in the incident, Monica Segatto, Luca Pollastri, Enzo Pontani and Paolo Forlani were found guilty of manslaughter due to excessive force and faced 6 months in prison, after the initial sentence of 3 years and 6 months was reduced due to a controversial pardon issued in 2006 by the Italian Parliament.
• 7 September 2006: Eugene Ejike Obiora, a Nigerian-Norwegian student, was killed during an arrest where Obiora had behaved aggressively toward personnel at the social services office in Trondheim. Obiora died en route to a hospital after a police officer held him in a stranglehold. The case made headlines and three officers were accused of racism and excessive use of force, but they were cleared by police investigators and the chief prosecutor.
• 7 January 2008: Wei Wenhua was beaten to death by police officers in Hubei province, China.
• 6 December 2008: 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos was fatally shot by police officer Epaminondas Korkoneas in Athens, Greece. Demonstrations and riots erupted throughout Athens almost immediately after the shooting, sparking weeks of civil unrest and workplace and university occupations throughout Greece and beyond.^[10]
• 1 April 2009: policing at the 2009 G-20 London summit protests included the controversial technique of kettling. A bystander, Ian Tomlinson, died shortly after being pushed to the ground by a police officer. An inquest found that Tomlinson was unlawfully killed. An officer in the Metropolitan Police's Territorial Support Group was charged with manslaughter, but found not guilty.^[11]
• November 2009: Johnnie Franklin Jones was beaten by Scott Harper and Brian Sherred of the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department in Santa Ana. The deputies insisted on pressing charges against him for possession of drugs, urinating in public and, finally, indecent exposure and resisting arrest. There was never any actual evidence found to support the charges, evidence, which actually contradicted the deputies claims, i.e. a negative drug screen. Claims of Jones urinating were brought up after the drug claims were refuted. No evidence other then the deputies claims was presented. When it became obvious that this tack wasn't going to pan out, they then claimed that Jones was "about to" expose himself. The District Attorney refused to file any charges and said that the deputies had no probable cause. The Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department sided with the deputies and said they did nothing wrong. In a civil lawsuit trial, Scott Harper could not keep his story straight, saying at one time Jones "had his hands in his pocket," another time saying Jones "had his hands down his pants." Later he even said "hands in pockets" and "hands down pants" are interchangeable. Scott Harper has additionally been accused of other incidents of police misconduct. As of 2015, he is still employed by Los Angeles County sheriff. It is not known if he has ever been disciplined for any of them due to California law that hides disciplinary records of police officers. ^[12]

From 2010

• 6 June 2011: 22-year-old Martin Neshkovski was beaten to death by Igor Spasov, a member of the special police unit Tigers, in the center of Skopje, Republic of Macedonia during the celebration of the ruling party's VMRO-DPMNE election victory, supposedly because he wanted to climb on stage and congratulate the Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski personally. After an unsuccessful attempt by the Macedonian institutions to cover up the murder,^[13] which was followed by two-day demonstrations in Skopje, Spasov admitted the murder. Protests were held daily throughout June and July, demanding greater control over special police unit members and political and moral responsibility.^[14]
• 9 July 2011: The United Nations human rights office expressed disappointment on the use of excessive force^[15][16][17] by the police against peaceful protestors in the Bersih 2.0 rally, which was organised by the Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (Bersih) calling for electoral reform in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
• 16 August 2012: The Marikana Massacre which occurred during the wildcat Marikana miners' strike was the single most lethal use of force by South African security forces against civilians since the Sharpeville massacre during the apartheid era.^[18][19]
• 17 July 2013: Deng Zhengjia was beaten to death with a scale during an encounter with multiple City Urban Administrative and Law Enforcement Bureau officers who confronted Deng for selling watermelons in Hunan province, China.

References