Cops cleared of assault in Kilmarnock

Nov 7 2008

TWO police officers have been cleared of assault charges after a sheriff branded the evidence against them as “not only unreliable, but incredible”.

Constables Alexander McCracken, 28, and John Carr, 41, were accused of repeatedly jumping and stamping on a man in Sunnyside Road, Kilmarnock, in June last year, while McCracken also faced charges of assaulting the same man and a woman by spraying them with CS gas.

The attacks were alleged to have taken place after the two officers responded to a call around 4.30am that a house in the street was under attack.

On the last day of the trial, the man who first called the police – giving evidence on a videolink from South Africa – said that the arrival of McCracken and Carr had saved the lives of those in the house.

Asked by Peter Watson, representing McCracken, what would have happened if the police had not responded to his call, Grant McGuire said: “Honestly, I think we would have lost our lives that night.”

Mr McGuire, 24, told the court that the police had been called when the house he was then living in in Sunnyside Road came under attack from a group of youths.

He said: “There were bricks and all sorts coming through the windows and people kicking at the door.”

During the trial the court hear that Constable McCracken and Carr had gone to a house across the road which they found full of rowdy, drunk youths.

Three of the group, including 17-year-old Rikki Wright, were arrested for a breach of the peace.

Trouble flared after the teenager’s sister, Michelle Wright, and father, Thomas Crawley, arrived on the scene, demanding to know why he was being arrested.

Constable McCracken, who accepted that he had used his CS spray, said that Mr Crawley shouted at him: “You are no lifting my f***ing boy. Come and deal with me, I’m no’ a boy.”

A struggle followed, during which the constable was grabbed from behind by Michelle Wright and fell to the ground.

Said Constable McCracken: “Just having been assaulted, lying on the ground with Michelle Wright and Thomas Crawley both standing there, I made the decision to deploy my CS spray.

“I told them to step back, but they didn’t back off. I sprayed CS spray at both of them for approximately two seconds each.”

The officer insisted that his use of force had been “minimum”.

He said that neither he nor PC Carr had kicked or stamped on Mr Crawley.

Constable Carr did not give evidence.

Earlier in the trial, prosecution witnesses – mainly relatives and friends of Mr Crawley and Miss Wright – gave varying accounts containing claims that both officers had kicked and stamped on the man.

Finding the two officers not guilty, Sheriff Desmond Leslie said that he did not accept that Constable McCracken’s use of CS gas had been excessive.

Dealing with the charge that both officers kicked and stamped on Mr Crawley, the sheriff said that he could not be satisfied by the evidence of the prosecution witnesses.

“The crown case gives me a great deal of trouble,” he said.