What happened
Frank Ogboru, 43, was a Nigerian businessman on holiday in London. In September 2006 police were called to a disturbance outside a block of flats in Woolwich, south-east London, after he became involved in an argument with a friend’s girlfriend.
Four officers held him. Witnesses, one of whom filmed the incident on a mobile phone, said officers had their knees and feet on him as he “wailed like a dog” and said he could not breathe. He lost consciousness and died.
The outcome
In 2008 the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was insufficient evidence to bring any charges. The Metropolitan Police was left to decide whether disciplinary action would be taken.
A CPS spokesman said police experts on restraint who watched the video were of the opinion that the officers “never achieved control until moments before Mr Ogboru lost consciousness”, and that the period of restraint was brief, taking only a few minutes. He said unreasonable force could only be established if Ogboru had been deliberately kept prone on his stomach for a significant period, and concluded that a jury would find the restraint was not unlawful.
What went wrong
What the source records is a death in a restraint that never achieved control. A man was on the ground with officers’ knees and feet on him, saying he could not breathe, and a bystander filmed it.
The CPS account rests on two findings: control came only moments before unconsciousness, and the restraint was short. Both may be true and still describe a fatal position. A hold that ends as the person stops responding is not control. It is the point at which the restraint has already done its damage.
The record carries no inquest conclusion, and no account of what officers did when he said he could not breathe. That gap is the case.
What it teaches
This is the case that shows how a short restraint is defended. The legal test turned on duration and intent: was he kept prone deliberately, and for how long. Neither question asks whether the position was safe.
The operational lesson therefore has to be about position and monitoring, and never about how long is allowed. A restraint that is brief can still be the restraint that kills. A service that trains staff to a duration is training them to a defence, not to a standard.
Questions for the room
- He said he could not breathe, and was filmed saying it. What does that require of the officers holding him, whatever the clock says?
- You are the officer who has just achieved control. What is the next action, and does it change if the struggle lasted two minutes rather than twenty?
- The legal test asked whether he was kept prone deliberately, and for how long. What test should the service apply instead, and who writes it?
- A bystander is filming. What difference should that make to the person on the ground?
Evidence and limits
Confidence: probable. The account rests on a single archive report of the CPS decision. The CPS statement itself was not opened, and no coroner’s or IPCC record was available for this pass.
No inquest conclusion is held, so this page cannot state the mechanism of death. It gives the position and what witnesses said, not a medical finding. The witnesses’ account is reported, not tested.
Ogboru is named because the reporting names him and the record does. No officer is named, and no finding is made about any individual. Disciplinary decisions were left to the Metropolitan Police, and no outcome is recorded.
Our physical interventions training covers position, monitoring and what happens after control is achieved.
Sources
- BBC News, 2008 · No charges in custody death case (archive clipping held with the case record; no live URL)
Reviewed 20 October 2026.