Two police officers who pepper-sprayed and tasered a 92-year-old amputee whilst responding to a call at his care home “used force first and asked questions later”, a jury was told.
Pc Stephen Smith, 51, and Pc Rachel Comotto, 36, are on trial at Southwark Crown Court accused of using excessive force on Donald Burgess during an incident at Park Beck care home in St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex, in June 2022.
The care home had called 999 after Mr Burgess, a single-leg amputee and wheelchair user, reportedly grabbed a knife and threatened to stab staff.
Pc Smith allegedly emptied a full canister of synthetic Pava spray into Mr Burgess’s face and struck him with a baton, with Comotto deploying her Taser – all within a minute and 23 seconds of entering the wheelchair-bound pensioner’s room.
Paul Jarvis KC, prosecuting, told jurors during his closing speech the officers failed to gather information about the situation before entering his room and simply sought to resolve it “as quickly as possible”.
He said: “Nothing that happened in Donald Burgess’s room that day was inevitable.
“It didn’t have to happen that way. It was not forewritten that the officers had to use the force that they did.
“Neither was it inevitable that because one type of force was used and didn’t succeed, there had to be another, and another.”
He added: “Time, we suggest, was not against the defendants in this case – it was very much in their favour, but the approach which they chose to take was use force first and ask questions later.
“We suggest that those features of the case and their behaviour upon arrival at the care home that day tell you something important about their intentions not to try and gather information, but to try and resolve it as quickly as possible without any of these considerations.”
Following the incident, Mr Burgess was taken to hospital after the incident and later contracted Covid. He died 22 days later aged 93.
Pc Smith denies two counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm for his use of Pava spray and for using a baton, whilst Pc Comotto denies one count related to her use of Taser on Mr Burgess.
Pc Comotto said she believed using the Taser was the safest way to “protect” Mr Burgess.
“I honestly believed the Taser was necessary,” she previously told the jury.
“It was proportionate because other tactics had failed. If I didn’t act, something worse could happen.”
Pc Smith previously told jurors he did not see that Mr Burgess was disabled and using a wheelchair as he was focused on the knife the pensioner was holding in his hand.
He claimed he only realised Mr Burgess was an amputee after the incident, when he was wheeled out of the room.
Mr Jarvis KC, referring to body-worn footage of the incident played in court during the trial, asked jurors: “How credible do you think is that testimonial?
“You have watched the video, you have seen it. We are talking about something that is happening right in front of his eyes and he claims not to have seen it.
“If he was honest… then the obvious question is, how could you imagine that he (Mr Burgess) was a threat to you or you colleague if he cannot stand up?”
The prosecution argues Smith resorted to using his Pava spray and then his baton on Mr Burgess “not because he had an instinctive feeling that there was need to use force to protect other people or Mr Burgess, but because he had had enough of it.”
The trial continues.
Man denies breaching restraining order against ex-007 producer Barbara Broccoli
Transparency about the ethnicity of the Liverpool suspect is good— on this condition
Constance Marten’s partner attacked officers on post-natal ward, court told
Four Just Stop Oil activists jailed for plotting to disrupt Manchester Airport
