The Hong Kong police on Tuesday received an official complaint against officers who knocked a 12-year-old girl to the ground and pinned her down while handling a street demonstration in Kowloon in September.

The young girl went with her mother, Mrs Ho, to Mong Kok police station to formally complain about the inappropriate use of force by at least three male officers, said Andy Yu, the Yau Tsim Mong district councillor who had been helping the family.

The incident happened on Sep. 6 in Mong Kok, Kowloon, as a street protest was taking place.

The girl and her brother were walking in Yau Ma Tei to buy art supplies, but they could not go through a police cordon as a mass protest was going on. A video clip showed the girl running away from a riot police officer before being tackled to the ground. Three officers then restrained her with their knees.

The video went viral, with criticism of the police’s use of excessive force on a little girl.

Police initially told the family that they had violated a COVID-19 ban on public gatherings of more than two people. The siblings were accused of breaching the social distancing measure despite the brother’s explanation of their familial relationship on the spot, which should have accorded them exemption from the ban, but the officers ignored his pleas and issued a penalty ticket to fine them.

Two months later, the police canceled the penalty ticket after the family clarified their presence at the protest site.

The 12-year-old wrote about her own feelings of the whole saga, saying that the violence and inappropriate use of force by the police was unacceptable. “It was abuse of force, not minimum force,” she said, noting that the police’s withdrawal of the fine proved the officers were abusing their powers in the first place.

“I was unarmed at that time and did not break the law, but I was humiliated by the police. Now I have been hurt and cannot forget this unhappy experience.”

Her mother also criticized the officers who handled the case for their poor and rude attitude.

Mrs Ho, who was also present at the scene, had explained to the police that her children were out to buy art supplies, but one of the officers assumed she was part of the protesters and told his colleagues there was “no need to listen to her explanation.”

Mong Kok police station said it would pass the complaint to the Complaints Against Police Office at the Wan Chai headquarters and would follow up with the complainant later.

It was understood that the officers involved were members of the Police Tactic Unit and not from Mong Kok police station, the district councilor Yu said.

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