A woman whose assault at the hands of police was caught on camera and led to a constable losing his job was found dead last month in her prison cell, it has emerged.

Sarah Reed, 32, was on remand at Holloway prison in London awaiting trial for assault. She was arrested after an altercation while detained in a hospital in south London. The family say she was acting in self-defence.

Her family are raising questions over why a woman who suffered from severe mental health problems was removed from care under a mental health team in the community and transferred to prison where, they claim, she was denied treatment for her condition.

Sarah Reed was held in Holloway prison. Photograph: Lee Jasper

Four years ago Reed was at the centre of a police brutality storm after she was thrown to the ground, grabbed by the hair and punched three times in the head by PC James Kiddie as he arrested her on suspicion of shoplifting.

The attack was so brutal that fellow officers who had viewed the CCTV footage of the incident reported Kiddie to the Metropolitan police’s directorate of professional standards. In 2014 he was found guilty of assault over the incident, sentenced to 150 hours community service and suspended.

Reed, who was convicted of shoplifting over the incident, had suffered from mental health issues since the sudden death of her newborn baby in September 2003. After her child died at Beckton children’s hospice, she and the child’s father were forced to carry the body in their own car to an undertakers, an ordeal she never recovered from, according to her family.

Over the following 12 years, Reed suffered from bouts of severe mental illness. Relatives told Lee Jasper, a former director of policing and equalities for London, that it was while she was detained under section 3 of the Mental Health Act in October that the altercation occurred that led to her arrest.

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Prison staff found Reed dead on 11 January and informed her family the same day, reportedly telling them she had strangled herself while lying on her bed. Relatives have claimed that officials asked them to identify Reed, but when they arrived they were treated with hostility and their requests to see her body were refused.

Jasper, who is acting as a liaison for the family until they are ready to speak to the press, wrote in a blog about the case: “The obvious fact that Sarah was ill meant that placing her in the criminal justice system without recourse to the medical help she clearly needed was an unforgivable act of brutality and cruelty. I am told that throughout her time on remand Sarah never received any medication. This would have constituted a living hell for someone whose life had been marred with personal tragedy, mental ill health and police brutality.”

A prison service spokesperson said: “HMP Holloway prisoner Sarah Reed was found unresponsive in her cell at 8am on 11 January. Prison staff attempted CPR, but she was pronounced dead shortly after.

“As with all deaths in custody, the independent prisons and probation ombudsman will conduct an investigation.”

• This article was amended on 17 February 2016. An earlier version said that Sarah Reed had been transferred from hospital to prison. This has been corrected.

