Woman sues after VPD arrest gave her broken nose and two black eyes
A woman sued the City of Vancouver after she was arrested during a street fight outside a nightclub on the Granville Strip.
The incident left the woman with two black eyes and a broken nose that needed surgery to correct. She alleged she was injured at the hands of a Vancouver Police Department (VPD) police officer, and launched a suit against the City seeking compensation.
It all started in June 2015 when the woman and her two friends were invited to a table by a man inside Aura nightclub. Several women who were already at the table became upset and wanted the newcomers to leave.
The disagreement escalated to the women throwing ice and spilling drinks on each other.
The woman and her two friends decided to leave Aura and headed down the street to Cabana Lounge. But one of the original women at the booth, still upset over what happened, followed the three friends.
As seen on CCTV footage from the street, the upset woman from Aura grabbed one of the friends’ hair and attacked her.
A melee between the women began, and VPD officers nearby stepped in to break up the fight. An officer approached the woman as she was kneeling over the woman who’d pulled her friend’s hair. She was throwing punches to the other woman’s face.
The VPD officer asked her to stop fighting, and when she didn’t, he pulled her up by the arms. In court, the woman stated she continued fighting to defend herself from the other woman.
A struggle ensued, which ended with another police officer pushing the woman’s face into the ground. It’s at this point she said her nose was broken by her head hitting the pavement.
BC Supreme Court judge Bruce Elwood, who reviewed the case this month, agreed with the woman that the balance of probabilities indicated the police officer’s use of force broke her nose and blackened her eyes.
However, the judge also determined the officer’s use of force was reasonable given the chaotic scene on the street.
He dismissed the allegations of battery, but paid more attention to a second part of the suit where the woman argued she was wrongly handcuffed in a hospital waiting room.
Woman awarded damages for waiting at hospital in handcuffs
The woman was placed in a police wagon while officers called for an ambulance because of her injuries. No ambulances in the area were available, so an officer escorted her to the emergency room of Vancouver General Hospital.
The woman waited in handcuffs in the triage area before a nurse told them it would be hours before she could be seen. The officer argued he kept her handcuffed because he was still assessing whether she would be a breach to the peace.
The judge, however, thought handcuffing her was wrong and called it “completely unnecessary.”
“In my view, there is no evidence to justify the use of restraint on Ms. Sidhu in the hospital. She was completely removed from… the scene outside the nightclub,” he wrote. “There is no evidence that she acted aggressively in the police wagon or in the hospital. There is no evidence she was a danger to PC Oliver or any of the hospital staff or patients.”
She waited no more than half in hour in handcuffs, and the judge ordered her to be awarded “nominal damages” for the minor affront to her dignity.