"REPREHENSIBLE, unacceptable, unprofessional."

This was how acting Police Commissioner Stephen Williams yesterday described the video which purports to depict a plainclothes police officer slapping a man and then taking him away in a marked police car.

The 57-second video entitled "Police Independence brutality" was posted on the CCN TV6 UReport days ago by someone using the name isiahblaxx.

The video has gone viral on social networking site Facebook with more than 42,800 views up to press time yesterday.

On Monday the video had just over 16,000 views.

Among those to have watched the video are National Security Minister Jack Warner, head of the Police Complaints Authority Gillian Lucky, and Williams.

Speaking at the weekly police press briefing at the Police Administration building yesterday, Williams said he saw the video, which "involves a police officer assaulting a member of the public".

"On behalf of the organisation I will like to state that there can be no justification for such reprehensible conduct of any police officer," Williams said.

"The Trinidad and Tobago Police Service will never support officers behaving in such unacceptable manners. I see it as unprofessional and we are really working hard at getting a professional organisation and it is incidents like these which take away from the hard work of officers as we seek to build a professional organisation."

Williams said the matter is being "effectively addressed", with investigations being conducted by both the Police Service's Professional Standards Unit and the Police Complaints Authority .

The investigations have been deemed as "high priority", Williams said.

The officer in question will remain on duty during the investigation, Williams said.

Williams slammed the officer's behaviour.

"Based on what I saw, that type of behaviour will not be condoned at all by the Police Service," he said.

Terrence Augustine, who has been identified as the man slapped in the video, appeared before a San Fernando magistrate on Tuesday charged with resisting arrest, assaulting the officer and using insulting language.

Augustine is said to have assaulted constable Richard Kishore.