A former PC has been banned from policing after he was convicted of assaulting an autistic 10-year-old school boy.
Christopher Cruise injured the pupil's knee as he dragged him by his coat then threatened to do the same to another student.
Following the incident Cruise retired but he has now been barred from returning to work in the police, Liverpool Echo reports.
The ex police constable was convicted of assault after a trial at Crewe Magistrates' Court.
He was fined £800 and ordered to pay £100 in compensation.
He later failed to overturn the conviction in an appeal heard at Chester Crown Court.
The January 2020 incident centred on the actions of the 57-year-old, of Long Lane in Aughton, against a severely autistic boy at a special school he was assigned to.
It led to a Merseyside Police misconduct hearing overseen last week by Carl Foulkes, the chief constable of North Wales Police.
An overview of the hearing, published on Merseyside Police's website, said the allegations faced by Cruise were that he breached professional standards because "when in his role as a Police Liaison Officer at a local school, he assaulted a pupil by dragging him by the coat, causing him to injure his knee and threatened another pupil with the same treatment".
It continued: "Former Police Constable Christopher Cruise was found to have breached the standards of professional behaviour, namely; use of force, authority respect and courtesy, honesty and integrity and discreditable conduct, contrary to the Police (Conduct) Regulations 2012.
"The finding of the hearing was that if Constable Cruise had still been serving with Merseyside Police, the breach of the standards of professional behaviour would have been assessed as gross misconduct, which would have led to former Constable Cruise being dismissed from the force without notice.
"As a result, former Constable Christopher Cruise will be placed on the College of Policing Barred List."
Relatives of the boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said it was unclear what started the incident, which they said was captured on CCTV.
A family member told the ECHO : "He has autism and he struggles a lot. He is much younger in his head, more like a five year old.
"He is also small for his age as he had growth problems.
"We are all absolutely furious. His days are hard enough already."
Following Cruise's hearing, Detective Superintendent Cheryl Rhodes from the force’s Professional Standards Department said: “"Merseyside Police takes the professional standards of its officers and staff extremely seriously.
"The actions of this officer are not reflective of the behaviour and standards of our schools officers who do a fantastic job day in and day out.
"Following the incident all schools officers underwent additional training in conjunction with the Merseyside Police training academy, School Improvement Liverpool and the local authority.
"The public quite rightly have high expectations of our officers and we seek to uphold that and ensure that the meet those expectations.
"Sadly, on a minority of occasions, when they fall short we will take swift and effective action to ensure that we retain the public’s confidence in the force."
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