High Court Increases Sentence For Police Officer’s Physical Assault

On Thursday, the High Court confirmed the Reykjavík District Court’s guilty sentence over a police officer, for physically assaulting a woman during her arrest in July 2013. The high court increased the officer’s sentence, adding a 30 day prison sentence, served on probation for two years.

The officer was also sentenced to a penalty of 300 thousand ISK, damages amounting to 430 thousand ISK, and all costs resulting of the case and its appeal.

The arrest was caught on video, which went immediately viral. As the Court ruling describes, the woman was intoxicated, and had trouble keeping her balance, as she walked across a street towards a pavement. A police car passed by and the car’s wing mirror hit the woman’s face. The car halted, the officer stepped out, using the car’s door to push the woman towards the pavement. As he entered the car again, the woman then walked back towards the car and spit through an open window. At this point, the officer opened the front door of the car, stepped outside again, grabbed the victim’s arm, throwing her on a bench on the pavement, manhandled her down and dragged her along the street, rested his knee on her body an handcuffed her, as she lay face down. The officer, along with his partner, then “put” the woman in the car, through the backdoor, where she was kept lying, face down.

The court ruled, as did the lower court before, that the officer had used excessive force in this operation.