HOMELESS CAMPAIGNER FATHER Peter McVerry has called for an investigation into a video which claims to show a garda shortly after pepper-spraying a homeless man.
The video shows a garda in Dublin arresting a homeless man, but does not show the lead-up to the incident.
Throughout the video, the homeless man is handcuffed and the garda keeps his foot on him while he waits for a car to take the man to jail.
As bystanders complain to the garda, he tells to move away “for their own safety”.
McVerry called for an investigation into the incident and for “any inappropriate behaviour” to be stamped out.
DIT student Philip Campion captured the video on Friday on Dublin’s Henry Street. His post on Facebook has been viewed 378,000 times and shared over 7,000 times.
In his description, he says that the homeless man was “treated like an animal”.
“When a Garda tried to arrest him he pushed him against the floor and pepper sprayed him right in the eyes when the poor man was clearly not making any sort of an attack or movement towards the Garda. He then stood there with his leg on the man as if the man was going to run somewhere.”
A Garda spokesperson could not comment on the contents of the video, but said that members of the public who felt they had witnessed Garda wrongdoing should contact the Garda Síochána Ombudsman’s Commission (GSOC).
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