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Met Police liable for £400k legal costs, after Taser victim wins court battle (26 March 2015)

Date: 26/03/2015
Duncan Lewis, Crime Solicitors, Met Police liable for £400k legal costs, after Taser victim wins court battle

The Metropolitan Police are to pay £400,000 in legal costs, after a court ruled they had used unreasonable force when officers used a Taser on a man they had stopped.

BBC News reports that Daniel Sylvester, 53, had been stopped by police officers three times in nine months between 2007 and 2008 – and on one occasion was tasered near his home in Edmonton, north London.

Mr Sylvester – the boss of a security company – fell to the ground “in agony”.

The court was told that a car he had bought had previously been owned by a known drug dealer with a history of violence. Mr Sylvester was tasered as he got out of the car, after being stopped by police officers and “boxed in” before being tasered. Mr Sylvester has since got rid of the car.

A jury at Central London County Court has awarded him damages of £8,200 for false imprisonment and assault, as well as post-traumatic stress disorder.

Judge Simon Freeland told the court that Mr Sylvester – a father-of-seven – had successfully established “the tort of false imprisonment”, which he added was of “real constitutional importance and significance”.

However, Mr Sylvester’s legal bill is likely to be in the region of £250,000 – and the costs for defending the case are likely to cost the Met Police around £150,000.

The judge has ruled, however, that the Met Police must pay all the legal costs in the case.

A spokesman for the Met Police said it was considering an appeal against the ruling.

After the hearing, Mr Sylvester said:

“I'd give one of those officers my compensation if they agreed to have done to them what they did to me – to know how it feels.”

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