NSW Police officer caught on bodycam saying he punched man in head ‘while he was down’

A NSW Police officer has been captured on his own bodycam footage telling colleagues he punched a man in the head “while he was down”.

Circulated online, the footage shows a group of NSW Police officers walking down George St in Sydney’s CBD during the anti-Herzog protests on February 9 and discussing a recent confrontation.

The protests, sparked by the arrival of Israeli President Isaac Herzog in Sydney, are now the subject of a Law Enforcement Conduct Commission inquiry following allegations of police brutality.

As the officers walk past the Haymarket Hotel, the male officer wearing the body camera tells his colleagues “I f**king pumped that c*nt”.

A female officer turns to him and says “oh, it was you? So funny” before the officer replies “yeah, yeah, and then I punched him in the head when he was down”.

The snippet of footage has been liked more than 6000 times on Instagram and reposted by more than 1,600 people.

NSW Police and state Police Minister Yasmin Catley have declined to comment, citing the ongoing LECC investigation into police behaviour during the protest.

Under the tagline Operation Makalu, the LECC investigation into police misconduct on February 9 has fielded more than 800 complaints and is reviewing more than 1000 hours of security camera footage.

Greens member of the Legislative Council Sue Higginson said the footage was “appalling,” and she had already reached out to Ms Catley to request the immediate dismissal of the officer involved.

“I was there that night. I interacted with police, I witnessed things I wish I had never had to witness. Unfortunately, the behaviour on display in that video did not happen in isolation,” she said.

“Unfortunately, that really was the tenor of a number of police officers, and in my view, it represents the level of impunity and hatred that many officers brought to that operation that night at Town Hall.”

“Some people would attend an event thinking that if a police officer was there, they were genuinely there to maintain the peace and keep the people safe. The truth of what happened that night is that wasn’t the experience.”

Ms Higginson blamed the Minns government’s repeated targeting of pro-Palestine protests for the officers’ attitudes.

“For the Minns Labor government to make several attempts to stop these protests, for them to introduce anti-protest law after anti-protest law, which the courts have deemed unconstitutional, was an escalation of division between the government, police and a movement for peace,” she said.