Scotland Yard has paid £85,000 damages to five people who were arrested, imprisoned for 40 hours and prosecuted after a protest outside a London embassy.

In a written apology to the activists, the Metropolitan Police said: “It is accepted that your arrest was unlawful and that any force used on you during your arrest was therefore an assault and battery.”

Jeremie Fernandez, who was one of the group assembled outside the Mexican Embassy, claimed that he had been detained in a deliberate attempt to silence protest.

A senior Met officer wrote to each of the five saying: “I am in no doubt about the significant effect that this matter has had on you and on your democratic right to peaceful protest. You should not have been arrested and I apologise for this.”

The case was settled this week in advance of a High Court hearing and comes at a time when the Met’s public order tactics are under increased scrutiny after the G20 protests.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission has received more than 150 complaints about the policing of the G20. It is investigating three complaints, including the death of Ian Tomlinson, 47, a newspaper vendor, who collapsed minutes after being struck and pushed to the ground by an officer.

The demonstrators who won compensation were at the embassy in Central London in October 2006 to protest against the shooting dead of a journalist, Bradley Will, in Oaxaca City. The three men and two women were arrested, handcuffed and held in police cells. They were denied bail before being charged with public order offences and tried at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court.

The case against one protester was thrown out and the remaining four were acquitted. They immediately began civil actions against the Metropolitan Police Commissioner alleging wrongful arrest, false imprisonment and assault.

The force said in its apology: “The policing of public order events and demonstrations . . . requires a careful balance of the rights and freedoms of often conflicting interests and necessitates officers making difficult decisions under notable pressure. In this case it is clear that balance was not achieved.”

Mr Fernandez, 32, said: “We were jumped on by police officers during a peaceful protest, handcuffed, locked up for 40 hours, denied police bail and then dragged through the criminal courts on false charges — all in an attempt to silence our protest.”

Mr Fernandez received £25,000 and the other four £15,000 each.

Tony Murphy, solicitor for the activists, said he would be referring footage of the incident to the parliamentary human rights committee.

Mr Murphy, of Bhatt Murphy, said: “What we are seeing, not least with G20 clients, is a culture of violence within the police and the systemic abuse of our rights. This case shows that if the police do not make a retreat from coercive policing, the cost to public confidence and to the public purse will be devastating.”

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