Vigil for Mohamud Mohammed Hassan, Tuesday 9th February. Photo. Tom Davies
Around 80 – 100 people gathered outside Cardiff Bay police station in the freezing cold on Tuesday night, for a candlelit vigil in memory of Mohamud Mohammed Hassan, the 24 year old Black man who died just hours after leaving the custody of South Wales Police.
The event was held to mark one month since his shocking death and to remember a life taken too soon. A message from the family was read out to those who had come. It thanked “everyone who continues to walk with us on our journey to uncover the truth as to why Mohamud died so soon after being released from the custody of South Wales Police.”
Text reading ‘Killed by South Wales Police’ & ‘Justice for Mohamud Hassan’ were briefly projected onto the front of the cop station.
Mohamud Hassan was arrested on the evening of Friday 8th January on suspicion of breaching the peace, but was released without charge the next morning. He died in his flat on Newport Rd, Cardiff, later that day.
South Wales Police immediately declared the death as ‘unexplained,’ but reports quickly emerged with various witnesses saying that Mohamud had returned from Cardiff Bay Police station to his flat with serious bodily injuries and blood stains on his clothes. According to the family’s legal team, a statutory post mortem later confirmed this and it has now come out that a staggering 52 police officers came into direct or indirect contact with the young man.
The Independent Office for Police Conduct (the IOPC) are investigating, but the body has been repeatedly attacked for being too tame. In June last year, Black families whose loved ones had died in incidents involving the police called for its abolition after citing repeated failures to bring about justice.
Four days of protest erupted following Mohamud Hassan’s death, with people demanding that the cops release all CCTV and body camera footage of his contact with South Wales Police. This has not yet happened, and the police and the IOPC are refusing to say whether any officers involved in the case have been suspended.
On Tuesday, the IOPC said it wouldn’t release any footage in case it was needed in “possible criminal, misconduct, or inquest proceedings” in the future. They said the family and legal team would be offered the chance to see “relevant” footage “at an appropriate time.” It is unclear how a future proceeding would be affected by the footage being released now, and the legal team say police body cam footage is often released in the US prior to a trial.
It has also now been revealed that the IOPC told the family and some members of the public that Hassan had come into contact with 52 cops in the short time from his arrest to his release. Lee Jasper, part of the family’s legal team, has also said that it appears that Mohamud Hassan was tasered more than once.
Lawyer Hillary Brown from Virgo Consultancy, also representing the family, has said that she has requested custody records and other key documents from South Wales Police and says that the family were ‘devastated’ when key information was shared with members of the public in a zoom meeting without their permission.
On Tuesday night,, as the crowd turned out to pay their respects to the young man, people spoke of their shock that this could happen in Wales. Those who knew Mohamud described him as a warm and friendly character, and this has compounded the sense of hurt and anger surrounding his death.
A message from the family was read out to the people who had gathered:
‘The family of Mohamud Hassan, who died prematurely and tragically one month ago today, would like to thank everyone who continues to walk with us on our journey to uncover the truth as to why Mohamud died so soon after being released from the custody of South Wales Police.
We as a family need your support and your strength to keep us focused on the pursuit for Justice for Mohamud whatever that looks like.
Mohamud was loved by his family and it is absolutely wonderful for his family to learn that he was and is someone special to you all also.
Thank you all for your support today and I hope we also continue to rely on it tomorrow.’
On Tuesday Mohamud’s Aunt, Zainab Hassan, who has spoken previously about seeing Mohamud return from police custody with serious injuries, gave an interview to Russia Today about her nephew. At points breaking into tears, she described the heartache of losing him:
“He was happy, he was always laughing about everything. Everything was one big joke to him. He was loved by my children. He was the older cousin and they loved him.”
“He was loved by the whole family and he has left a hole in our lives. I don’t think I could ever express enough how it feels to have my nephew taken from us in such a horrible way.”
The issue of police racism was ever present at the vigil. Standing near the large ‘Justice for Mohamud’ banner was Kamil, who said that he felt that Black lives like his own were now endangered by the police in Wales.
He said that police aggression towards young Black men in particular starts early, and described how he used to be stopped, searched and frisked when he was just 13 years old, in his school uniform, when he was walking back from his high school in central Cardiff.
The mood at the vigil was sombre but the day itself had seen a surge in online activity for the Justice 4 Mohamud campaign and press coverage beyond Wales, where media coverage remains limited.
The campaign is also gaining international attention in the wake of the huge Black Lives Matter movement, and the pressure from this global movement is now bearing down on South Wales Police and the IOPC. A CrowdJustice page has been set up to fund the family’s legal battle.
