Police split inquest row funding

Roger Sylvester fell into a coma after he stopped breathing

A police body has voted to fund both sides of a legal fight over the death of a man after he was restrained by officers in north London.

Eight officers were suspended after an inquest last October found Roger Sylvester was unlawfully killed.

Last week a Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) committee voted to fund their fight to overturn the verdict.

But at a meeting on Thursday MPA members voted to pay the Sylvester family's legal costs as well.

It is thought to be the first time the MPA has chosen to fund both sides of a legal action and experts will first have to decide whether it is even possible.

The committee members who met in private last week were advised of Home Office guidance that police authorities fund officers in legal cases.

We should be even-handed in our treatment of both the Sylvester family and the eight police officers involved Toby Harris, MPA chairman

But after the decision was leaked to the press, the MPA called it in and discussed it during a two-and-a-half meeting on Thursday.

At one stage one member, lawyer Peter Herbert, threatened to walk out, saying the decision to fund the officers would do "incalculable harm" to community relations.

MPA chairman Toby Harris said the decision to fund the officers did not imply support for their attempts to seek a judicial review.

But he said: "Those proceedings might help define what is meant by legal restraint, as exercised by officers on operational duties, and clarify how and when it should be used."

He added that it was important the Sylvester family could pursue their case for "full disclosure of the facts".

Roger Sylvester's parents hope to find out more about their son's death

"We are also very clear that we should be even-handed in our treatment of both the Sylvester family and the eight police officers involved in the case."

The officers involved insist 30-year-old council worker Mr Sylvester was restrained in line with police guidelines.

He collapsed after being restrained in a padded room at a psychiatric hospital and was in a coma for seven days, before being pronounced dead on 18 January 1999.

The inquest jury ruled he died from brain damage and cardiac arrest due to breathing difficulties caused by restraint.

Metropolitan Police Federation chairman Glen Smyth said officers needed support.

He said: "The great irony about this case is that at least one of these officers is black, so to pretend that it is about race is wrong.

"We are rapidly approaching a situation similar to what we are told exists in parts of America where medically-trained professionals step over people because they know they are not covered and nobody is going to support them."