According to a police statement on Wednesday (Oct 14), a 35-year-old woman was arrested after she had poured soup over a stranger’s head and scuffled with him at Novena Square.
A minute-long video of the woman’s arrest was circulated on social media and on Whatsapp Messenger.
In the video, the woman can be seen surrounded by four police officers — three male and one female — while speaking to them.
Another two officers were shown speaking to another man a few metres away from the incident.
One of the four officers surrounding the woman suddenly grabbed her right arm, and then the other officers appeared to place handcuffs on her, then led her away. The woman resisted, shouting and jostling.
In the video, the woman could be heard shouting to the officers: “This is against human rights. Why is this necessary?”
According to a report by Today Online, the police said that it had responded to a call for assistance at Novena Square at 4.24pm after the woman shouted at random to a male patron in a restaurant.
She then allegedly poured a bowl of soup on the stranger, and in the subsequent scuffle, the woman spat at the man and bit his right hand. The man, 32, was later taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital.
Police said that when officers engaged her at the mall, the woman continued to shout “incoherently”. Her relative, who was at the scene, was unable to calm her down.
She was apprehended under the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) Act and is being investigated for voluntarily causing hurt and using criminal force to hinder a public servant from his duties.
In a Facebook post on Wednesday (Oct 14), Human Rights Lawyer M Ravi shared a link to the video, calling it “OUTRAGEOUS AND ABUSE OF POWER”.
He wrote: “This lady is subjected to arrest by 3 male police officers and one female police officer based on the video that was forwarded to me by a lawyer”.
“To handcuff someone unlawfully in public is a serious offence if such arrest is declared by the court as unlawful. It also attracts criminal penalty of false imprisonment and battery. From what I see this arrest is totally unacceptable. Hope the this matter is raised in Parliament. My colleagues from other countries are shocked at the extent in which police effect arrest”, Mr Ravi added in his post.
https://www.facebook.com/ravi.mravi.7/posts/10214396323342377