A police officer has been found guilty of assaulting a vulnerable 16-year-old who had been filming outside Merthyr Tydfil police station. Inspector Dean Gittoes was unable to control his emotions as he left the boy struggling to breathe, a judge found.
Gittoes stood trial at Cwmbran Magistrates' Court where he denied attacking the member of the "auditing" community, which records videos of public buildings such as police stations and uploads them to YouTube. District Judge Sophie Toms found the 49-year-old committed common assault and had no reasonable grounds to arrest the boy under the Terrorism Act.
The boy had gone to the police station just after 2pm on August 20 last year, wearing a dark mask and a dark hoodie with the hood up. As Gittoes grabbed his hood, the boy could be heard sobbing: "He's choking me... I can't breathe."
