The body representing Norfolk police has expressed dismay after a man who attacked four officers was spared an immediate jail sentence.
Aaron Bussey, 30, kicked one officer in the head and kicked and spat at others as he was arrested in King’s Lynn on February 27.
Magistrates in Lynn, who heard there had been “many assaults, some serious”, sentenced him to 26 weeks’ custody, suspended for 18 months.
He was also ordered to pay £100 compensation to each of the four police officers after he pleaded guilty to charges including assaulting an emergency worker and assault with intent to resist arrest.
Norfolk Police Federation, which represents rank and file officers, said the sentence had failed officers who “deserve the protection of the law”.
It comes despite new guidelines doubling the maximum sentence for assaults on police and other emergency service workers from six to 12 months.
Federation chairman Andy Symonds said: “These sort of sentences of which the offender spent zero time behind bars means it emboldens others to attack officers.
“This is why I’m seeing officers sustaining more and more serious injuries than they ever have before. This is why we’re seeing year on year rises in attacks on officers.”
The latest Home Office data shows there were 616 attacks on police officers recorded in Norfolk in the year up to March 2021.
One hundred and four resulted in an injury to the officer, while in 512 cases the officer escaped physically unhurt, though this included offenders spitting and coughing at police during Covid.
Among the most serious was a shocking attack on three officers including Inspector Laura Symonds, who suffered a fractured eye socket, that saw Norwich man Shannon Lovelock jailed for four years.
Mr Symonds said: “It's not part of the job to be assaulted and must never be. So when it does happen as we work in risky and dangerous environments then we expect that the courts protect us from these attacks."
Magistrates were told Bussey, of Wisbech Road, South Lynn, who also admitted assaulting a security guard and possession of a class B drug, had been on a cocktail of drink and drugs and apologised to police after sobering up.
"I’m certain that if the four victims of this person's unprovoked attacks upon them were members of the public then he would have been sentenced to time in prison,” said Mr Symonds.
More protection for police
Maximum sentences for assaults against emergency service workers were increased last year after the Police Federation’s Protect the Protectors campaign.
But they will double again to two years as part of the new Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, currently awaiting royal assent.
The new advice includes factors classed as “high culpability”, such as the “intention to cause fear of serious harm, including disease transmission” in common assault cases, as well as intentional coughing or spitting in both common assault and ABH offences.
The bill also includes so-called ‘Harper's Law’ that will introduce mandatory life sentences for those who kill on-duty emergency workers while committing a crime.
It was named after newly-married PC Andrew Harper, 28, who was dragged to his death by a getaway car in August 2019. Three teenagers were jailed for manslaughter.
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