Territorial Support Group - Criticism

Criticism

Officers in the TSG have faced criticism about their policing methods and complaints have been made against officers of the TSG. Senior officers say that the type of work that the TSG are involved with, policing protests and performing drug raids makes them more likely to have complaints made against them.

As the result of a freedom of information request made by The Guardian newspaper, it was revealed that more than 5,000 complaints were made against the TSG in 4 years but only 9 have been upheld. Commenting on these figures, a member of the Metropolitan Police Authority stated that officers in the TSG are "practically immune" from criticism.

One ex-Metropolitan Police officer suggested that TSG members, "spend (their) days waiting for action, and far too many officers join seeking excitement and physical confrontation." Some officers are ex-military personnel and these are "the worst bullies" as "the laws of the battlefield are not appropriate to the streets of our capital".

The forerunner of the group, the Special Patrol Group, was implicated in the death of Blair Peach.

In 1997 a man was beaten by officers from the TSG in what was described as an "outrageous display of brutality", which only stopped when the man pretended to be unconscious. The man was charged with assault and threatening behaviour over the incident but was cleared after photographs of his injuries showed the officers had lied about the case under oath. After the man's acquittal the officers went on trial accused of assault in 1999 but were later cleared.

In 2003, six officers of the TSG performed what a judge in 2009 called a "serious, gratuitous and prolonged" assault on a terrorist suspect, Babar Ahmad, a 34-year-old IT support analyst who was not subsequently charged with any offence. The officers involved had already been the subject of as many as 60 complaints about unwarranted assaults against other men. A number of mail sacks containing these complaints were somehow lost. The accusations were investigated by the Independent Police Complaints Commission but that they were found to be unsubstantiated. Five of the six officers were still members of the TSG in 2009. Babar Ahmed was later awarded £60,000 compensation, by the High Court, for the assault. In August, 2009, it was announced that the police officers accused of attacking Babar Ahmad would face criminal charges. However all four officers were found not guilty in June 2011 after a recording from listening device placed in Mr Ahmed's home surfaced shortly before the trial which "proved the account originally given by these officers was correct and specific details of the complaint made by Mr Ahmad were not present"

In 2005 a Kurdish youth recorded an officer on his mobile phone telling him "If you say one more fucking word, I'll smash your fucking Arab face in" after he was stopped near Paddington Green police station. The officer was suspended but denied the charge.

Another investigation into six other officers of the TSG by the IPCC was launched following allegations made by three men that they were racially abused during an incident during June 2007 in Paddington. A van of officers stopped after seeing youths mouthing obscenities towards them. The officers appeared in court in December 2008 and were prosecuted; two for racially abusing the men, four of misconduct in a public office and one of racially aggravated assault. The Guardian reported that a request may have been made to restrict reporting of the trial by the media. The officer who was driving the van acted as a whistleblower during the trial. One officer, a former Royal Marine, accused in this case was also involved in the assault of Babar Ahmed and has had 31 complaints lodged against him since 1993. In November 2009 he was cleared of all offences, along with the other officers, and returned to work with the TSG.

During the 2009 G-20 London summit protests two officers of the TSG were suspended from duty following publication of videos which recorded alleged assaults on members of the public at the 2009 G-20 London summit protests and at a subsequent memorial. In the first case, the member of the public, Ian Tomlinson, died shortly afterwards. In the second case, Sgt Delroy (Tony) Smellie was seen hitting Nicola Fisher. Following her complaint, the Crown Prosecution Service announced in September 2009, that there was sufficient evidence to charge Sgt Smellie with assault. He appeared in court on 16 November 2009 and was cleared of assault charges on 31 March 2010 at City of Westminster Magistrates' Court. However, he could still face misconduct proceedings over the incident.

Video evidence shows that the officer seen hitting Ian Tomlinson had his face covered and that the officers involved in both cases were not displaying their identification numbers. Following the investigation into police handling of the protest, the human rights group Liberty called for further study of what it referred to as the "militaristic approach" used by the TSG.