I used to work despatch on the platforms here in my past life and know the individuals involved personally.
One of my ex-colleagues rang me up a couple of hours ago telling me all about this latest drama and I just knew it would be all over the forum...
Firstly, the man on the floor is a nutorious trouble maker at Sutton and Epsom and well known to staff and PAX alike for being a nasty piece of work whose been in and out of jail / on the streets for years, he set fire to his flat.
He's part of a regular group of D&O characters who would come through the station all the time, drinking, doing drugs, kicking off, refusing to leave the station and generally harrasing us as we tried to get on with our work.
Calling BTP was useless as others have mentioned above, they are simply overworked and understaffed south of that river, and could take hours just to come down and remove someone causing a nuisance, there are far more higher priority jobs. -(that's why you see so many "plastic BTP" REO's/RNO's and the dreaded "STM Mafia" everywhere these DAYS..)
In fact the only time we'd ever see real BTP was during revenue blocks with the RPI's/RPO's etc..
That station supervisor who appears in the video, -the guy on the left in the hi-vis -(a decent bloke btw) would usually ring the local met office around the corner on Carshalton Road to get a swift response when things were kicking off.
I seen everything from a mad guy running across the tracks, being chased along platform 1 by the met from the pikey site on the abandoned office block next door there, complete with heli giving chase, while I tried to get the juice rail cut and line blocks, to another "troubled" character who would regularly take great delight in s**ting up the walls and trashing the gents toilets at Epsom..
There was never a dull moment down there...
GTR management were/are totally incompetent and useless too, barring a few.
They would never support us when things went tits up and would be nowhere to be seen during disruption, hiding in their offices while we took dogs abuse from the punters out on the platforms.
There was/still is a culture of bullying, racism, harassment and backstabbing, especially since the whole DOO / ticket office dispute kicked off.
Remember the last train "early lock-up" incident at Sutton a couple of years back that also made the news?!
Anyway, there is two sides to every story and whether what we seen in the video was right or wrong, this guy is most definitely NOT the "innocent victim" that everyone is making him out to be.
From what I heard, him and his mate were being their usual selfs, drinking and causing a bloody nuisance, harassing everyone around the gateline all morning, despite being politely requested to leave the station on numerous occasions.
My thoughts and sympathy are with C and all the team at Sutton during this difficult time.