The female protester who was struck by a police officer during G20 clashes has employed the PR guru Max Clifford to deal with media requests for interviews, it has emerged.

Nicky Thompson has been thrust into the spotlight after amateur video emerged on YouTube of an incident outside the Bank of England on April 2.

In the footage, a police officer wearing body armour is seen hitting Ms Thompson across the face with the back of his hand and striking her legs with a baton.

Ms Thompson, who works in an animal sanctuary in East Sussex, was said to have been deeply traumatised by the incident.

But as the day wore on, in a bizarre turn of events, it emerged that she had asked Mr Clifford to negotiate a deal with the media and will charge a fee for interviews.

Her sister, Natalie Thompson, from Brighton, said: “We have been inundated with offers from journalists and it has obviously become quite a high-profile story today.

“We have had reporters camped outside our house and all sorts so it is (Max Clifford) dealing with it now. There is likely to be a big exclusive story in the pipeline.”

Asked about the incident, Ms Thompson said: “I’m not supposed to comment. It has been stated that there are injuries but I’m not allowed to comment but I have been misquoted already.”

A representative of Mr Clifford, who acted as spokesman for the reality television personality Jade Goody in the final months of her life, confirmed that he was representing her.

Ms Thompson says she was hurt during clashes between protesters and police outside the Bank of England during the meeting of G20 countries in London to discuss the global financial crisis.

She was in a crowd of more than 100 people attending a vigil for newspaper seller Ian Tomlinson, who died from a heart attack during protests the previous day, minutes after being hit with a baton and shoved to the ground.

The video which emerged this week on YouTube shows her shouting at police before an officer wearing body armour hits her face with the back of his hand.

She shouts: "I am a woman," and the officer replies: "Go away." He draws an extendable baton and appears to strike her behind the thigh, provoking roars of abuse from other protesters.

A constable from the Met Police's territorial support group has already been suspended over the Tomlinson incident, and last night a sergeant in the same police unit was suspended in connection with the incident involving Ms Thompson.

Today Met Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson went further, asking the Inspectorate of Constabulary to carry out an independent review of policing tactics during major protests, and ordering his officers to review all police footage of the protests to identify whether any other untoward incidents occurred.

Ms Thompson's sister told London’s Evening Standard that her sister now hopes to take the case against the police officer as far as possible, and has taken photographs of her alleged injuries to hand to investigators from the Independent Police Complaints Commission.

“My sister was terrified after the attack and very traumatised. She did not want to come forward earlier because she feared nothing would be done but once the footage was released on the internet, she decided to do something about it,” she said.

New pictures emerged today of the woman, wearing a brown cap pulled down over her eyes, facing the officer in Threadneedle Street, and spilling her orange juice as the baton hits her.

Members of the Metropolitan Police’s forward intelligence team, which gathers information on potential troublemakers, can be seen in the background.

Tristan Woodwards, a 25-year-old administrative worker from Basingstoke, posted the video of the April 2 incident on YouTube.

He also posted a second video capturing a conversation in which an officer tells protesters that any policeman caught attacking someone on camera will “come unstuck”.

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