Two ‘experienced police marksmen’ killed a Brazilian electrician at Stockwell tube station by shooting him 7 times in the head just over a year ago.
He was not the man they thought they were following, but because a surveillance officer had to answer the call of nature as the electrician was leaving his flat, they mistook him for a terrorist. After following him to the bus stop, then throughout his bus journey to the underground station at Stockwell, they were told by their Gold Commander to ‘stop’ him. She says she didn’t mean for them to kill him, but they did.
No police officer is to be charged in relation to this, though one officer is likely to be disciplined for altering a surveillance log, and the Metropolitan Police is likely to be prosecuted for a breach of Health and Safety Law for failing to ensure that the public were not exposed to risks to their health or safety.
I’m not trying to slag off the police generally, but I think it’s a disgrace. What do you think?
Totally, if you’re going to shoot someone once, let alone 7 times, make sure you have the right guy. Both the police officers should be sent to jail for such a thing. It’s not so much their fault as it is extreme carelessness, but things like that should never happen.
One shot in the head is more than enough to kill any man. 7 is ridiculous. If nothing else they should be charged taking it way to far. Never mind the fact that they killed the wrong guy…But Imagine how they must have felt after they found out that they just murdered an innocent man.
These 3 parts stand out to me.
Shot 7 times in the head? I can believe that they shot 7 times, but unless they kept shooting him in the head while he was on the ground, obviously dead, so they missed a few times first? However, they say they were ‘experienced’, so I guess they must have done the latter… awful.
Says she didn’t mean for them to kill a known terrorist? Riiiiiiiiiight… the noted alterations of the surveilance logs to cover negligence suggests otherwise.
Although they later found out they were mistaken, at the moment that they fired the shots, those officers believed that the man was carrying a concealed bomb, that might go off if he had any chance at all to trigger it. If the bomb had gone off, the officers would have died or been horribly maimed.
On the basis of the information they had been given, those officers believed themselves to be taking a huge risk with their own lives and the lives of anyone else around them. They were incredibly brave.
Their training was to ensure absolutely that there was no brain activity left that would allow the supposed terrorist to trigger the supposed bomb. One bullet? Two? Seven? Frankly, if I was already dead, I wouldn’t worry about the extra five or six bullets.
The fact that they were later shown to be acting on false information is irrelevant. They had to act on the information in front of them at the time.
It was a terrible mistake and those officers’ lives will have been changed forever too.
I am surprised the Brazilian government is making so much fuss - the Brazilian police used to go out shooting homeless children just to tidy up the streets. Anyone smell a whiff of hypocrisy?
3,500 people die on Britain’s roads every year, and almost every one of those deaths arises from negligent or reckless personal conduct far more reprehensible than what those officers did.
And anyone remember how many Americans are shot by other Americans in a typical year?
Or how many soldiers in the two gulf wars were killed by friendly fire?
I feel very sorry for mr. De Menezes, his family and loved ones, and very sorry for all of the police officers involved in this horrendous mistake. But let’s have some context and perspective.
I think the moral of this story is: don’t run from armed police if you’re innocent. I don’t think you can blame officers for carrying out orders in an extremly difficult situation, with potentially hundreds of lives of members of the public at stake.
Though Mike makes some very valid points; the officers involved were acting in good faith, I believe someone ought to be prosecuted for trying to cover up the actions of those controlling the operation.
It just seems a bit bizarre to me that The Met is being prosecuted under health and safety law. Should Mr Menezes been wearing a hard hat? Maybe the officers forgot to put out a yellow “slippery floor” warning cone At least it means we’ll hear a little more from those involved about what actually happened.
And besides the maximum penalty would be a fine for the Met… Who are funded from the public purse… So that would achieve naff all.
I think the lack of a public enquiry into the July 7th bombing should be much higher up people’s list of things to be naffed off at the government for than this sad incident.
I really dont think it matters at all how many times he was shot. Police are trained in these situations to shoot to kill. And you dont want to shot the chest because you could set the explosive off.
Again, shoot to kill, no matter how many shots. They shouldnt be charged, if anybody, it should be the people how gave incorrect information. And that was probably a mistake.
The police had the information that said he had a bomb concealed. They did what they thought would save the most lives. I’m sure they didnt want to kill them and I feel extremly sorry for them.
If you were told that someone has a bomb that they could set off and it was from someone you had to trust then I am sure the correct thing to do is to kill that person with the bomb.
I do not know about the running so I didnt comment on it.
I hope no one says the renowned anarchist MikeFule is carrying a bomb, as anarchists are prone to do. Word might get to the police, but they might be told to follow a unicyclist, and the cop stops to answer the call of nature (just my luck), and they see me on MY unicycle, and shoot ME dead. Or any unicyclist dead.
Would it be MikeFule’s fault, for using the anarchist symbol as his avatar, and associating unicycling with bomb-throwing anarchists, by turning the uni wheel into the symbol of anarchy in his avatar? YES! MikeFule gives all unicyclists a bad name by making people think we’re all bomb-throwing anarchists! MikeFule endangers us all! MikeFule is to blame for any unicyclists getting shot dead by the police. That’s why he is an apologist for shoddy police work killing innocent people.
