Copped Enough: call for courts to support frontline officers

6 November 2025

A West Mercia Police Federation rep says frontline officers need support from the wider criminal justice system to show attacks on them are ‘unacceptable’.

PC Andy Forbes backed PFEW’s national 'Copped Enough' campaign, calling for stronger punishments for attacks on officers.

It follows the sentencing of a thug for assaulting an officer during the worst UK football disorder in decades.

Dawid Dembler was given a suspended jail term for kicking a West Mercia officer in the back during sustained violence at Aston Villa’s European game against Legia Warsaw in November 2023.

Dembler, from Walsall, was also banned from attending football matches for five years at Birmingham Crown Court.

Andy, who was one of a number of West Mercia Police officers supporting their West Midlands colleagues that night, was injured in the disorder in a separate incident outside Villa Park.

PC Andy Forbes has backed PFEW's Copped Enough campaign call for tougher sentences for those who attack officers.

He was initially struck by a traffic sign as he cleared debris from where officers were positioned before being engulfed in flames after being hit by a flare.

And Andy said the sentence given to Dembler highlighted the need for the national Copped Enough campaign and its calls for the toughest possible sentences.

Disorder

An experienced officer with 20 years of public order policing, Andy said the disorder was ‘like nothing I’d seen before’.

“The violence that our colleagues in West Mercia and other forces experienced that night was shocking and totally unacceptable,” he said.

“It’s been described as the most serious violence seen at a football match in decades.

“I’d certainly never experienced anything like it, and it was incredibly lucky that none of the officers were seriously injured that night.”

Toughest sentences

Andy added: “We are husbands and wives, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, and we shouldn’t have to face violence just for the uniform we wear.

“Which is why we need the courts to support us and hand down the toughest sentences, particularly given the nature of the sustained violence we faced that night."

The 2022 Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act saw the maximum sentence for assaults on a blue light worker, including police officers, increase from 12 months to two years after lobbying by the Federation.

Copped Enough

The Copped Enough campaign highlights the growing numbers of attacks on officers, with 32 violently assaulted every day.

It is calling for more protection for the frontline with stronger sentences for assaults on officers.

Andy said: “The number of officers being assaulted every day, as highlighted by the campaign, is criminal.

“My frontline colleagues need the courts to support us and give people who attack officers the toughest possible sentences.”