After a six-day trial, a Dunedin District Court jury found Constables Brenton David Rooney (33) and Duncan Roy Hollebon (37) guilty of assaulting Daniel Murray Wiel in Dunedin on February 15.
They found Rooney guilty of intentionally injuring Mr Wiel and Hollebon guilty of assaulting him with intent to injure.
The kicks happened as Mr Wiel resisted attempts to handcuff him following a pursuit.
The charges were laid after Constables Johnathon Dunn and Lachlan McDonald made statements about the incident.
After deliberating for eight hours, the 11-person jury was unable to reach a unanimous decision.
At 6.15pm, it passed in a majority 10-1 guilty decision on the counts against Rooney and Hollebon.
The verdicts drew a few gasps from the 30 or so people in the public gallery. Rooney declined to comment afterwards.
Hollebon said he was "surprised and devastated" by the outcome, but declined to comment further. Lawyers for both said appeals were likely.
Both men have been suspended on full pay since the incident came to light in February last year.
Southern police district operations manager Inspector Lane Todd said the men were now subject to the employment process under the police code of conduct.
He commended the actions of Consts Dunn and McDonald.
"We believe this conviction and the process to bring these two people to court can give the public confidence that these kinds of actions will not be tolerated."
He said police believed this was an isolated incident.
"However, when these kinds of allegations are made, we take these complaints seriously and ... investigate thoroughly," Insp Todd said.
In response to questions about what support officers making allegations against colleagues received, and what, if anything, was planned to reinforce to officers that kicking alleged offenders while restraining them was inappropriate, he said the New Zealand Police had policies and procedures in place to provide staff with avenues to make internal complaints and supported the staff involved.
He would make no further comment on various aspects of the case until the court process was complete.
The men were remanded on bail for sentencing on July 16.
