This article originally appeared on VICE UK.
It was around 7 AM on May 3, on a quiet, residential street, that Sheku Bayoh came into contact with the police. Within 15 minutes, he was unconscious and by just after 9 AM, he had been pronounced dead within a nearby hospital. It’s a tragic sequence of events that we have become inured to hearing over recent months, as the world has watched on in horror at tales of police brutality, killings, and subsequent protests, in the United States.
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It is not a story that you expect to hear taking place in Kirkcaldy, an unassuming Fife coastal town of around 50,000 people, less than an hour north of Edinburgh. The events of that morning have since shaken the town and given rise to a desperate search for answers as to how, and why, Sheku Bayoh died.
What Bayoh’s grieving family and his legal team understand of what happened is this: Responding to calls that a black man had been seen carrying a knife, police officers—in the midst of a shift change at Kirkcaldy police station—responded en masse. Batons, CS spray, and the similar but more potent PAVA spray were used, as up to nine officers engaged the 31-year-old gas engineer who, originally from Sierra Leone, had lived locally for 15 years and had two young children.
He was pinned, facedown, to the pavement. When it became clear he was losing consciousness, Bayoh was rushed to hospital, where medical staff made a frantic effort to save his life and had to demand that the police remove the handcuffs and leg restraints he had been taken there in. A short time later, he was pronounced dead. How Bayoh died has still to be determined, although positional asphyxia—that restraint by police officers prevented him from breathing adequately—suspected.
Pathologists do not yet have the full information necessary to confirm this because, until last week, they were unable to get statements from the officers involved, despite having made “several attempts” to do so. With an investigation live, Police Scotland have not been in a position to pass comment beyond offering their condolences. However, the Scottish Police Federation, a de facto union organization that represents police officers, has been vocal over the past few weeks and has criticized “unhelpful” commentary and speculation around the case. They have said that a “petite” female officer, who feared for her life, received significant injuries during the incident and has made several visits to hospital.
On Sunday, exactly five weeks on from the death, Bayoh’s funeral was held. Gathering at the site where the arrest took place, around 400 mourners joined a solemn, dignified, and mostly silent procession through the town. Many were dressed in bright blue, Bayoh’s favorite color, and wearing T-shirts bearing his face. The march was led by Bayoh’s family and his partner Collette Bell, clutching their five-month-old son Isaac. A hearse, with a floral wreath spelling out “Daddy,” led the procession as it made it slowly made its way through Kirkcaldy’s streets.
Outside the town’s police station, two minutes silence were held, before some of the crowd broke out into chants of “we want justice.” The police, who accompanied the march in numbers, backed off as it approached the station, remaining at the end of the street. The march continued to Kirkcaldy Islamic Centre, where a ceremony and prayers were held, followed by a burial at a nearby cemetery. Later in the day, hundreds gathered again for a meeting in a community hall, which heard from members of Bayoh’s family and their representative, the prominent human rights lawyer Aamer Anwar.
Among family and friends of Shek, as he was known to them, the anger at local police is palpable. Exactly what happened that morning has been difficult to establish, not least because the family say they were provided with five different and often conflicting versions of events by the police in the hours that followed the death.
Bayoh’s partner, Collette Bell, was questioned and had her house keys taken away from her before she was even notified about his circumstances. When she was eventually told, the story provided by officers was that Bayoh had been found in the street by members of the public, who called an ambulance. His sister, who lives locally, was relayed a similar version of events. At 4:30 PM, officers returned and told the assembled family that they had been instructed by a senior officer to inform them of the truth of the situation—that Sheku Bayoh died in police custody.
Aamer Anwar (left).
Addressing the packed meeting which took place after the funeral ceremony, the family’s solicitor Aamer Anwar slammed what he called the “systematic lies” that officers provided the distraught and grieving family over the course of the day.
“Police Scotland, over those several hours from 9 AM onwards, gave five different versions of events to the family. That is a matter of grave concern. Sensitive and thorough handling of the investigation in the golden hours after the death is critical to evidence gathering, and setting the direction and quality of the investigation to follow,” he said. “The family does not understand why the officers who engaged with Sheku Bayoh were not immediately suspended without prejudice after his death. It’s a matter of public concern that officers remain at their desks or in contact with the public, pending the outcome of an investigation into a death in custody.”
Sheku’s partner Collette Bell (center) holding their son.
An independent body, the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (PIRC) has since been appointed to take control of the investigation. PIRC was established in 2013 as the Scottish equivalent of the Independent Police Complaints Commission for England and Wales, and this is believed to be the most serious case they have dealt with to date. Already, its credibility has been brought into question after it emerged that the body does not have the powers to compel officers to provide it with statements in situations in which they could be themselves culpable.
“PIRC came onto the scene later that morning, but we understand that the nine officers, who had been in a room together for several hours, refused to provide any details of what happened,” Anwar told the visibly shocked room on Sunday—a version of events that the Police Federation denies.
“We understand that the Police Federation subsequently said that they wished to know what their status was, but the fact remains that PIRC have stated publicly that they asked several times for statements which the police officers refused to provide,” said Anwar.
Last Thursday, over a month after Bayoh’s death, officers finally agreed to give statements to PIRC. The incomplete knowledge about the circumstances in which Sheku Beyoh died has been a key factor preventing pathologists, both those appointed by the Crown and independent experts hired by the family, in determining the cause of death. “The fact that for 32 days, the officers refused to provide us with information, and that PIRC could do nothing about it, beggars belief and compounds the agony of Sheku’s family,” said Anwar. “The family strongly urge Kirkcaldy police officers to co-operate with the investigation, to help provide them, the Crown Office and PIRC with accurate information with how and why Mr. Bayoh died. There is nothing unreasonable about this demand.”
There are many unanswered questions about the death of Sheku Bayoh. It’s the latest and most serious scandal to hit Police Scotland, which has been riven by controversy since it was formed as a merger of Scotland’s regional police forces in April 2013.
The force has come under fire, with its extensive roll-out of stop and search, revealed as being “nine times” that of the NYPD, ongoing controversy over armed officers responding to routine calls, and active hindering of research critical of their operations. They now stand accused of covering up the circumstances in which Sheku Bayoh died, pitting themselves against a community that is struggling to come to terms with the loss of a popular and well liked young father. The fiery war of words that has broken out between the Bayoh family and the Scottish Police Federation, which represents officers, has done little to sooth relations.
“We won’t rest until we get justice for Sheku,” his sister, Kosna Bayoh, said on Sunday. His family have so far tried to keep an open mind about what happened that morning, in the face of what are widely seen as police lies, intransigence, smears, and attempts to blame Bayoh for his own death. They deserve justice, but it remains to be seen whether the institutions tasked with delivering it are capable of doing so.
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