SAPOL Cop Who Allegedly Slammed Handcuffed Man’s Head into Ground Walks Free

Sergeant Simon Mark Johnson, accused of coward-attacking a handcuffed suspect, has walked free from court.

Johnson, 38, stood trial in the District Court over his alleged assault of Lennard Gordon Kennard Ware in October 2019.

The incident occurred after Ware, admittedly not the sharpest tool in the shed, stole a car and led cops on a high-speed chase. He was arrested after turning into a dead-end street and attempting to hide in a Dudley Park backyard. Surrounded by cops and realizing he had nowhere to go, put his hands up in the air.

As the POLAIR pilot stated, “Looks like he’s taking directions and complying”.

This wasn’t good enough for the SAPOL goons, who proceeded to viciously assault Ware – after he was handcuffed.

There is no doubt Ware was assaulted. Footage from the POLAIR helicopter (see below) clearly captures an officer viciously kicking Ware – while he was handcuffed and lying on the ground – at least 5 times.

The officer who repeatedly coward-kicked Ware while he was lying on the ground is reported not to be Johnson. Johnson’s charges arose from his alleged and subsequent instruction to another officer to turn off his bodycam. Johnson, it is alleged, then slammed Ware’s head into the ground with such force it was heard by neighbours who emerged to see what all the commotion was about.

Johnson hired David Edwardson KC to represent him. Edwardson argued it could not be proved beyond reasonable doubt that Johnson slammed Ware’s head into the ground, which means Johnson’s alleged “turn off the camera” request served its intended purpose.

Johnson claimed he was almost run over by Ware when deploying road spikes during the car chase.

Johnson then gave his version of events regarding his interaction with Ware after the arrest.

“I squatted down in front of him at that time … I discussed with Mr Ware my opinion of his manner of driving and I said words to the effect of ‘what gives you the right to put my life at risk, what gives you the right to put my officers’ lives at risk, what makes you think your life is better than ours – it’s just stupid behaviour’,” he said.

Sure. That sounds like the kind of thing an angry, adrenaline-charged SAPOL goon would say to a suspect.

Johnson also told the court he didn’t recall asking another police officer to turn off their body-worn camera but he “may have”.

“It may have occurred for the purpose of concealing the identity of STAR group members … the other reason may have been because we don’t record conversations police officers have regarding investigations,” he said.

So it sounds like Johnson did make the request to have the camera turned off. His claim it was to protect the identity of other STAR group members is rubbish (what have they got to hide?), as is his “investigations” claim – Johnson and his fellow SAPOL thugs were conducting an arrest, not an investigation.

Edwardson also claimed Ware’s head injury was not from being kicked and stomped by gutless goons, but from “self harm”.

Despite the numerous holes in Johnson’s story, the jury fell for his high-priced KC’s antics and unanimously acquitted Johnson.

Ware is clearly a menace and repeat offender (just like many SAPOL cops are).

The role of a police officer, however, is not to act as judge, jury and executioner. Most cops are of low to moderate intelligence, and are wholly unfit to pass judgments of any kind. Their job is to arrest criminals and hand them over to the court system to be judged and sentenced. As history has repeatedly demonstrated, they often can’t even do that properly, instead preferring to pick on easy targets, harass those who stand up to their rampant corruption and malfeasance, and engage in blatant revenue-raising.

If a civilian attacked a criminal suspect in the manner that the SAPOL goons did on the night of Ware’s arrest, there is a very real likelihood the civilian would suffer a worse legal fate than the criminal. But because their real job is to raise revenue and enforce draconian government policies, the thugs at SAPOL are repeatedly given a green light to engage in thuggish, criminal behaviour that would see the rest of us lumped with a criminal conviction and a jail sentence.

As an interesting aside, notice how SAPOL cops never assault pedophiles and rapists?

Would that be because SAPOL is full of pedophiles and rapists itself?