Three police officers gave innocent black man serious anal injuries with a baton in stop and search.

 Three police officers gave innocent black man serious anal injuries with a baton in stop and search

Théodore Luhaka was assaulted by three police officers in a Paris suburb in 2017 (Picture: AFP)

Three police officers have been spared prison after leaving a black man with ‘serious anal injuries’ after a stop and search arrest.

Théodore Luhaka – who had no criminal record – had a promising football career and was about to relocate to Belgium to join a professional club at the time.

A trial into his case was told that he was assaulted with a police baton, which left his anus perforated and him incontinent.

The 29-year-old is still suffering the consequences of that blow inflicted on him in 2017 in the Paris suburb of Aulnay-sous-Bois.

What happened to him has since turned into one of the most high-profile cases of abuse in the hands of police in France and sparked two weeks of riots in the capital.

Protesters also gathered outside the French court as the three police officers who stopped Mr Luhaka were on trial.

People march in the streets of Aulnay-sous-Bois, north of Paris, France, holding a sign reading ‘Justice for Theo’ (Picture: AP)

They held slogans highlighting police brutality against black people and called for the trio to be jailed.

‘It is a masquerade to have a suspended for mutilating Theo for life,’ said one of the protesters, Samia El Khalfaoui, whose nephew Souheil was killed by a police officer in 2021.

Instead, Marc-Antoine Castelain, Jeremie Dulin, and Tony Hochart avoided prison and were convicted of voluntary violence on Friday.

Castelain, who was initially charged with rape, was handed a one-year sentence, while his colleagues, who were found to have beaten Mr Luhaka, were given ones of three months.

France’s former president Francois Hollande visited the victim in hospital shortly after the attack (Picture: AP)

The victim, who was aged just 22 at the time, says he has been ‘living dead’ since that fateful day.

He also suffered a four-inch gas to his large intestine.

But the judges ruled that the injury caused to Mr Luhaka could not be considered a permanent disability.

His lawyer, Antoine Vey, said the decision is a victory that confirms that ‘Theo was a victim and nothing justifies that he was beaten’.

Prosecutor Loic Pageot had sought a three-year suspended prison sentence for Castelain and judged Mr Luhaka’s injury to be a permanent disability.

He asked for six months and three months suspended prison sentences for the other two officers.

‘We need a police that protects us, not police officers like these who employ gratuitous violence,’ he told the court on Thursday, describing the violence as unnecessary and ‘vengeful’ as Mr Luhaka did not pose an immediate threat.