Police shoot suspect....................er why? (page 30)

Simon

There was a rumor going around that it was not the police but the SAS/SBS - anymore news on this?

No. All we've had is Tony Blair who now can't remember if there has been a change in policy or of it should have been raised in parliment.

Nice to know they can impose marshal law and have shoot-to-kill policies on our streets without even telling us isn't it?!

ISP

Leaked report lists 'blunders' as police shot bomb suspect
By Daniel McGrory and Stewart Tendler

SCOTLAND YARD made “a series of catastrophic errors” that led to armed officers hunting the July 21 bombers shooting dead an innocent Brazilian, it was claimed last night.

Leaked witness statements from officers who took part in the botched operation reveal that Jean Charles de Menezes was restrained by one of Scotland Yard’s surveillance team before being shot eight times as he sat on a Tube train.

Documents and photographs from the Independent Police Complaints Commission investigation also reveal that one of the undercover team meant to be identifying the shot man was relieving himself as Mr de Menezes left his flat on July 22, so could not tell if they had traced Hussain Osman, one of the alleged bombers. It is also suggested that Mr de Menezes could have been taken alive.

Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, will come under pressure to explain how a sophisticated police operation went so badly wrong.

An ITV News investigation claims that when Mr de Menezes, 27, was challenged by police on the Northern Line train at Stockwell he did not make any aggressive move. Police claims at the time that the electrician was “behaving erratically” are alleged to be false.

The blunders began as Mr de Menezes emerged from his flat in Tulse Hill in South London at 9.30am. The undercover officer who was meant to identify anyone leaving the flats admitted that he had left his post, so could not communicate observations or take video footage.

His advice was, “It would be worth someone else having a look”, to ensure that they had the right man. No other officer apparently took a picture of him, although Mr de Menezes had to take a bus to the station. Even so, Gold Command at Scotland Yard, which ran this operation, declared a “code red” and handed responsibility to CO19 — the firearms team.

This armed team had been given photographs of alleged bombers, yet no one realised that Mr de Menezes bore no resemblance to them. The report states that the firearms unit had been told that “unusual tactics” might be required and if they “were deployed to intercept a subject and there was an opportunity to challenge, but if the subject was non-compliant, a critical shot may be taken”.

CCTV footage shows that Mr de Menezes was wearing a thin denim jacket that could not conceal a bomb, and he was not carrying a bag. Far from running from police, he did not realise that anyone was following him and even picked up a free newspaper before using his season ticket to pass through the barrier. He began to run only when he saw his train pull into the station. At the time of the shooting, Scotland Yard said that Mr de Menezes’s “clothing and his behaviour at the station added to their suspicions”. It was only when Mr de Menezes boarded the train that a surveillance officer guided four armed police into the same carriage.

A man sitting opposite him is quoted as saying: “Within a few seconds I saw a man coming into the double doors to my left. He was pointing a small, black handgun towards a person sitting opposite me.

“He pointed the gun at the right hand side of the man’s head. The gun was within 12 inches of the man’s head when the first shot was fired.”

The report reveals that one of the surveillance team grabbed Mr de Menezes before he was shot. “I grabbed the male in the denim jacket by wrapping both my arms around his torso, pinning his arms to his side,” a statement says.

“I then pushed him back on to the seat where he had been previously sitting . . . I heard a gunshot very close to my left ear and was dragged away on to the floor of the carriage.”

Last night Harriet Wistrich, lawyer for the dead man’s family, said that there were still “far more questions than answers” about police conduct. The family called for a full inquiry.

Rosangela Rebelo, a cousin who lives in the dead man’s home town of Gonzaga, said: “The family always believed his cousins, who lived with him in London, over the police version of events. I never believed he ran away. The family is still waiting for justice. They killed an innocent man.”

CONTRADICTIONS

Police de Menezes wearing suspicious clothing
Evidence to inquiry Wearing only thin denim jacket
Police Acting suspiciously on way to Stockwell station Evidence to inquiry Nothing odd in his behaviour
Police Challenged at station and refused to obey instructions
Evidence Challenged for first time while seated on train Police de Menezes vaulted ticket barrier to escape
Evidence Did not vault. Ran only to catch train
Police Eight shots fired into him
Evidence Eleven shots fired, three missed


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Leaked report lists 'blunders' as police shot bomb suspect
Met chief's defence of shooting open to question
Police fail to link London bomb attacks
Four anti-terror arrests at Manchester airport

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22989-1738517,00.html

ISP

LittleToe

"The Times" is a fairly reputable newspaper, too. Assuming this is official, this is truly tragic. It's a wonder they didn't accidentally shoot their own survellance guy, as well as other passengers, given that three bullets may have gone astray!

ignored_one

I'm going to think twice about running for a train from now on.

Ignored One.

ignored_one

Actually does this mean i'll have to curtail my favourite London past time?

Rushing for the doors as they shut is such a rush.

Simon

What a disgrace.

I notice that the vocal supporters of the police action have wisely decided to shut up and hopefully now regret the rediculous and callous comments that they have made.

"He asked for it"

Sheesh.

Simon

"The Times" is a fairly reputable newspaper, too. Assuming this is official, this is truly tragic. It's a wonder they didn't accidentally shoot their own survellance guy, as well as other passengers, given that three bullets may have gone astray!

Yes. Remind me again who the terrorists are that we are supposed to be afraid of?

ISP

The truth about this awful situation is that the full facts were known within minutes of the killing...the security services knew the guy was not armed, was not wearing a thick coat....was not the guy they were after...etc etc...etc. But it did not stop them trying to cover up the mess. They also have been quite happy to let their boss look a complete asshole as he went public to explain that the guy was in someway related to the bombings etc.

ISP

doogie

Remind me again who the terrorists are that we are supposed to be afraid of?

ha. it reminds me of Team America: World Police. they always ended up doing way more damage then the people they are trying to capture (like blowing up the eiffel tower and the sphinx).

plus the love scene is hilarious.

ISP

Focus: Executed: Anatomy of a police killing
The real story of how an innocent man was shot by police is only now beginning to emerge. Jonathan Ungoed-Thomas investigates the accusations of incompetence and cover-up
The day after Jean Charles de Menezes was shot dead by police at Stockwell Underground station, his grieving relatives and one of his closest friends filed into a mortuary to identify his body. They found him covered in a thin sheet and his face, unmarked, was ghostly white.
Gesio de Avila, a friend and fellow worker, looked carefully over the body, confused by de Menezes’s peaceful repose. Where were the wounds from the seven bullets to the head that killed him?
“Every bit of colour had left his face, but apart from that it was normal,” de Avila said last week. “There was a bandage on his head behind his ear and when I looked closer, I realised what had happened. He had been shot several times in the back of the head. It was like he had been killed by bandits.”
De Menezes’s cousins, Alex and Alessandro Pereira, who were also at Greenwich mortuary in southeast London, were outraged by what they saw.
In their view, seven bullets into the back of the head, almost certainly at close range, did not seem like an appalling accident; it seemed like an execution.
“He was on the train with a newspaper on his way to work and they killed him,” said Alex. “He would never have run from the police. He was assassinated.” Ever since de Menezes’s death, those who knew him have felt a double injustice: both the untimely loss of a loved one and a refusal by the British police to acknowledge fully the tragic errors that led to his death.
Although the police soon admitted they had killed an innocent man, it was only last week that a proper account of what happened emerged. Leaked documents from the investigation into de Menezes’s death revealed a shockingly different version of events to the original ac- counts, including those apparently sanctioned by the police.
The documents show de Menezes was behaving normally when confronted; he never ran from police; he did not leap a barrier at the station; he was not acting suspiciously; and he was already being restrained by an officer when he was shot.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1743478_1,00.html

Seven shots to the back of the head..........while being restrained was an execution.

ISP

Police shoot suspect....................er why?

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