Shane Su­perville

A po­lice of­fi­cer has been placed on sev­en days’ in­jury leave af­ter he was struck by a stone thrown by a men­tal­ly ill man in Cou­va on Wednes­day night.

Po­lice said the of­fi­cer re­spond­ed to a re­port of a dis­tur­bance at Car­oli­na Vil­lage and was asked to as­sist am­bu­lance work­ers at 11 pm.

When he ar­rived, he was told the man had been throw­ing stones. The man, an out­pa­tient of the St Ann’s Psy­chi­atric Hos­pi­tal, had not tak­en his med­ica­tion and was act­ing vi­o­lent­ly.

One of the stones struck the of­fi­cer at the back of his head. He re­ceived three stitch­es at the Cou­va Health Fa­cil­i­ty.

Of­fi­cers, along with the man’s broth­er, sub­dued him and se­cured him in an am­bu­lance which took him to the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.