A German policeman has been suspended for two years after he was filmed using a pepper spray to stop a woman from attacking him in a police station.
Police in the southern city of Dortmund say that the man, who is in his 30s, said that he was told by his superior to put his hands behind his back.
In a video of the incident posted online, the officer, who has not been identified, can be heard saying “I told you to put your hands behind your back.”
“The person who made this comment was clearly aware of the fact that the pepper spray was in the officer’s possession,” said prosecutor Christian Guehl.
Police have confirmed that the officer has been fired from his job, but said that it would be difficult to determine if he has been disciplined because he is not under arrest.
The police chief in the city of Düsseldorf said that the incident was completely unacceptable.
“It is obvious that this individual did not have the necessary professional training and he should have received immediate training,” Dülseldurf police chief Thomas Danker told German news site dpa.
The video of what was said to be the second time a police officer has used pepper spray has been viewed almost 5.5 million times on YouTube.
The incident took place at the office of the local police union, which has been in the midst of a debate over its use of pepper spray.
A local paper said that police officers are given training to deal with such situations.
“The use of such force should never be allowed in police stations, whether in the name of protection, self-defence or even in the event of a serious crime,” the paper wrote.
In the video, the police officer can be seen approaching the woman and pointing his weapon at her, while the woman can be filmed running away from him and then running towards another police car, which appears to have its lights on.
The woman can then be seen standing next to a police car as she is pepper sprayed.
The man who is seen using pepper spray, also known as a ‘Policeman of the Year’, has been given a three-year suspended sentence.
The SPD has defended the actions of its officers, saying that they acted in self-defense when confronted by a person who had threatened to kill them.
“A police officer uses a very strong and aggressive tool,” the SPD’s head of public relations, Ulrich Seibert, said in a statement.
“This was a necessary measure, and it was only right to use it.”
