The Legal Observers NSW report on the policing of the anti-Herzog rally on 9 February is based on over 150 items of footage, witness statements and observations from legal observers.

FULL REPORT HERE

Key findings include:

• Uses of force were observed against individuals with clear, visually obvious vulnerabilities (such as a walking stick or other mobility aid). The uses of force were indiscriminate and disproportionate to the conduct of the specific individual targeted, bearing no observable relationship to it.
  • In one instance, a person with MS experienced a muscle spasm during which her arm made contact with a police officer. The person apologised and her sister informed police she had MS. Several police officers tackled her to the ground and wouldn’t release her despite her sister repeating to police that she has MS and is disabled.
• In numerous cases, police officers applied force to individuals who were already restrained and subdued, where no clear directions had been issues, where individuals were complying with police directions, attempting to disengage, or requesting information about how to safely leave the scene
• The first arrests at the protest were of Blak Caucus First Nations organisers who had been acting as intermediaries between the crowd and police, in circumstances in which they were complying with police directions. This had the effect of reducing the capacity for communication between police and sections of the protest group and escalating tensions.
• The conduct of PO during the protests revealed a persistent failure to provide adequate assistance, information or direction to members of the public. This was particularly observed during moments of potential crowd crush, when the risk of serious injury is heightened. Officers apparently failed to discharge duties owed to individuals in their care or under their authority, including failing to provide medical assistance and by failing to lawfully issue directions prior to arrest or the use of force. Across multiple incidents, individuals were deprived of access to exit points, separated from friends and family, subjected to searches without any apparent lawful basis, and arrested or subjected to OC spray in circumstances where no instructions or directions had first been given. In several instances, requests by protesters to leave the area were refused or ignored by officers, leaving individuals subject to a requirement of compliance that was effectively impossible to meet by reason of physical constraint, or that could not reasonably be met in the conditions of crowd containment that police had themselves created.
  • Mounted police charged a section of the crowd that did not have anywhere to move due to being surrounded on the other three sides by lines of officers, creating a dangerous crowd crush.
• A bystander was handcuffed by police for making a comment towards them as they were passing by the pub where the was sitting. The police handcuffed him in such a way that the handcuffs pierced his skin and his wrists were bleeding.
• Continuing arrests of participants in the rally following the 9th of February have directly restricted the capacity of community members to provide evidence to the LECC, because participation now carries the risk that police will bring further prosecutions on the basis of relatively minor conduct. The deployment of substantial police resources to carry out early morning raids on the homes of protesters has compounded that effect, producing an ongoing intimidatory effect on those who participate in protest and placing at risk, on an indefinite basis, the ability of people to protest safely and without fear of police violence.

Spokesperson Adam al-Hayek said:

“The report lays bare a stark and troubling reality of police conduct. What unfolded did not happen in isolated pockets, or in the heat of the moment by individual officers. Rather, across different locations and times, the same tactical pattern repeats. One of collective and systemic police escalation. Deliberate, dangerous, and by choice, again and again, with disregard for the serious and foreseeable risks it created.

These risks materialised in injuries to real people, with Legal Observers NSW documenting at least 20 incidents involving injury.

Continuing arrests of participants in the rally following the 9th of February have also restricted the capacity of community members to provide evidence to the LECC, because participation now carries the risk that police will bring further prosecutions on the basis of relatively minor conduct. Early morning raids on protest participants have created an intimidatory effect that interferes with the efficacy of the LECC investigation.

The events of the 9th of February are not isolated. Over recent years, Legal Observers NSW have documented a rapid escalation in the use of force by NSW Police against protesters. A 60 year old man pepper sprayed in Wollongong. A 13 year old child sprayed in Sydney. And Scores of protesters sprayed at a defence expo last November. Well before the 9th of February, people at peaceful protests had already suffered twisted ankles, broken bones and significant bruising. This escalating rate of police violence at protests must stop.”