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A constable has told a court how he was ordered to get a baton and pepper spray to help "contain" a prisoner being held in a Whakatane police station cell.
Constable Dean Oswald received the order from Sergeant Erle Busby, one of four officers on trial for assaulting the prisoner, Rawiri Falwasser.
At the trial in the Tauranga District Court yesterday, Mr Oswald spoke of a plan to "restrain" Mr Falwasser.
Also on trial are Sergeant Keith Parsons, Senior Constable Bruce Laing and Constable John Mills.
The four policemen are alleged to have assaulted Mr Falwasser with batons and pepper spray in the cell on Labour Day 2006.
Mr Oswald, appearing as a Crown witness, said he was in an office at the police station when Busby came in and instructed him to grab a side-handle baton and come down to the holding-cell area.
Mr Oswald said Mr Falwasser was agitated and confrontational when he arrived and he was ordered to pepper-spray him if needed to distract him.
He said that was his part in a plan to "try and tackle Mr Falwasser so we could restrain him".
Mr Oswald pepper-sprayed Mr Falwasser twice, one jet hitting his face and the other landing on his body.
"It didn't appear to work. Probably if anything, it made him more agitated."
He said Mr Falwasser was screaming and yelling, and chanting in Maori.
The 27-year-old had been arrested for stealing a car and was refusing to be fingerprinted or photographed when the incident took place.
He had never been in trouble with police and the Crown is arguing he was suffering a psychotic episode.
