Police launch probe into footage showing officer yelling ‘chill out or I’ll choke you’

This is the moment a police officer yelled ‘chill out or I’ll choke you out’ while pinning a suspect to the ground as he complained he could not breathe.

The officer pushed the man up against a car in Halifax, West Yorkshire, before pulling him to the ground on a road while arresting him on suspicion of assault. 

Footage showed the man waving his hand across his throat during the arrest. But the officer appeared to try to hit him during the incident on Sunday, shouting: ‘Chill out or I’ll choke you out. Chill out, or you’re going to sleep. Chill out, chill out.’

A man named Ahmad Hassan got in touch with MailOnline to claim he was the arrested person and said it felt like a ‘racist attack for being a British Asian’. 

Detectives said they urgently investigated the video after it was circulated on social media and the officer has been removed from frontline operational duties. They have also voluntarily referred the incident to the Independent Office of Police Conduct.

The trouble flared on Sunday when an officer parked up their marked police van to arrest the man on suspicion of assault.

He was filmed flinging the man, wearing black cycling shorts, into into the back of a van as he pleaded: ‘Look. What have I done?’

The officer then appeared to grab the man around the neck and wrestled him to the ground on a zebra crossing between roadworks before placing him in an arm lock.

The officer was then heard telling the man to ‘chill out or I will choke you out’ as a colleague moves in to assistant in the arrest.

Both officers, wearing yellow high visibility vests, were seen to kneel on the man before the first one bellowed: ‘Turn over. Turn over. Now.’

The officer then flipped the man over onto his stomach. Both officers then pinned his arms behind his back and knelt on his shoulders while radioing for back up.

Hassan sent in the clip of the arrest to MailOnline, and said: ‘This is me in the video getting attacked by a police officer.

‘I was not resisting arrest and the police officer kept on trying to choke me out, and at the end he punched me in the face also which is shown in the video. 

‘Then the officer broke his position of trust and wrote in a statement saying I attacked him when he was arresting me on the floor. 

‘Clearly shows I did not resist arrest. This officer has clearly abused his position. I have never felt so afraid. West Yorkshire Police is aware of this.’

Hassan added: ‘I never thought something like this could happen in the UK. We hear about this in the USA but for it to happen in the UK is appalling. 

‘I felt like this was a racist attack for being a British Asian. Everyone in our community has seen this video and are very disappointed with the police and lost their trust.’

He added that the incident on Spring Hall Gardens in the town had ‘angered many people in Halifax and the surrounding areas’.

West Yorkshire Police Temporary Assistant Chief Constable Osman Khan said: ‘We are aware of a video circulating showing the arrest of a man at Spring Hall Gardens, Halifax on Sunday, August 16 in relation to assault offences.

‘We immediately reviewed the footage and looked into it as a matter of urgency to establish the full circumstances.

‘We have reviewed the actions of the officers involved and a referral has been made to the Force’s Professional Standards Directorate.

‘Our investigations remain ongoing and we have made a voluntary referral to the Independent Office of Police Conduct.

‘The officer involved has been removed from frontline operational duties. The man arrested was released under investigation.’  

It comes nearly three months after black man George Floyd died in Minneapolis on May 25 when a white police officer knelt on his neck for nearly eight minutes. 

Mr Floyd’s death has led to widespread protests across the world, including in London and other UK cities, in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.