Met police officer who slapped boy, 16, in face found guilty of assault
Met police officer who slapped boy, 16, in face found guilty of assault
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PC Sevda Gonen hit the boy in the back of a police van as he was being transported to hospital in London. A police officer who slapped a 16-year-old boy with mental health difficulties “multiple times in the face” as he was being transported to a hospital in London has been found guilty of assault.
Judge Briony Clarke found Metropolitan police PC Sevda Gonen guilty of assault for striking the boy “multiple times in the face with an open palm” after “she allowed her frustrations to get the better of her” on 13 November 2023, according to the prosecution.
Gonen, 33, of Leytonstone, London, and another Met police PC, Stuart Price, 35, were also found guilty of carrying out an unlawful search, amounting to assault by beating at Westminster magistrates court on Friday. Police were initially called after the boy was reported to have been aggressive at his home address and acted violently towards a mental health worker who was attempting to perform an assessment.
A camera inside a police vehicle captured a conversation between the officers on their way to the boy’s home, in which Gonen was heard to call him “a fucking little shit”, the court heard. Price said of the boy: “He’s a fucking dickhead,” with his colleague replying, “I’ve had enough of him.”.
Gonen apologised for the remarks on Thursday, telling the court the conversation was “in the heat of the moment”. Prosecutor Lyndon Harris said Gonen “in particular disliked” the boy and “had formed the impression that he was wasting their time by faking some form of mental illness”.
