7 Hong Kong police charged over protester's filmed beating
By KELVIN CHAN
Associated Press
2015-10-15 04:05 PM
HONG KONG (AP) — Hong Kong police on Thursday charged seven officers with harming an activist who was beaten in a filmed confrontation that stirred outrage among city residents at the height of the pro-democracy protests last year.
The seven officers were charged jointly with one count of grievous bodily harm and one also was charged with common assault, a police spokeswoman said, providing the information on condition of anonymity following office practice.
The officers are due to appear in a magistrate's court Monday.
The activist, Ken Tsang, said police informed him he should also expect to be arrested. He said police called to ask him to report to a police station and told him they planned to charge him with one count of assaulting an officer and four counts of obstructing police, although it's not clear what specific incident those charges would involve.
The charges against the police officers are being laid exactly one year after the filmed encounter that occurred during the protests that gripped the city for months.
As protesters and authorities battled into the early hours of Oct. 15, 2014, for control of an underpass outside government headquarters, local station TVB filmed officers taking a handcuffed Tsang behind a building in a nearby park.
The footage showed the officers placing Tsang on the ground, then one punches him while several others kick him.
