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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
National
Jessica Murray Midlands correspondent

Dalian Atkinson: officer accused of assault ‘lashed out’, court told

Dalian Atkinson Mary Ellen BettleySmith Benjamin Monk Paul Jarvis Police Football
Mary Ellen Bettley-Smith
Mary Ellen Bettley-Smith is facing a retrial after a jury was unable to decide if she was guilty of assault. Photograph: Jacob King/PA Media

A police officer accused of assaulting Dalian Atkinson, the former footballer who died after being Tasered by police, likely “lashed out, perhaps in anger”, a court has heard.

Mary Ellen Bettley-Smith, 32, of West Mercia police, is on trial accused of assaulting Atkinson in Telford in August 2016, when she struck him with her baton three times while he lay on the ground after being shot with a stun gun by another officer.

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