from Birmingham Mail
2nd December 2009

A police inspector on duty when Michael Powell died in custody defended his decision to send the father-of-three to a police station instead of a hospital.

Mr Anthony Guest, who has since retired, told the inquest jury at Sutton Coldfield Town Hall that he believed Mr Powell’s behaviour had been “violent” in the moments before he was put into a police van. Officers had been called to the home of Mr Powell’s mother in Wilton Road, Lozells, after reports the 38-year-old had smashed windows on the property and a car in the driveway.

Mr Powell was also said to have run towards a police patrol car with an unknown weapon before smashing a rear window.

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from Socialist Worker Online
1st December 2009

Mikey Powell died in police custody because of the way he was restrained, a medical expert told the ongoing inquest into the Birmingham man’s death.

Evidence is continuing to be heard at an inquest at Sutton Coldfield town hall into the death of Mikey Powell. He died six years ago in a prison cell at Thornhill Road police station after being arrested outside his family home in Lozells, Birmingham. Officers used CS gas and physical force to control Mikey after he smashed windows at his mother’s home in September 2003.

He was handcuffed, bundled into a van and taken to Thornhill Road police station in Handsworth where he died after suffering a cardiac arrest. It is not known if Mikey was forced to lie face down or on his side in the police van.

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