London Bomb suspect shot

[SuperDave]

People (police) in plain clothes chasing you, maybe your english is limited or non-existent, what would you do?

If that was the case then who can blame the guy for running? I agree with MikeL on the grounds that the guy possibly had limited english which could very easily have complicated the situation pushing it to the point of being shot and killed.


The killing at point-blank range with five shots to the head in front of shocked passengers on a packed underground train triggered speculation of a radical change of tactics by traditionally unarmed British police.

It's hard to comment on what has happened seeing that we only know what the media report to us which we all know can dramatically change how we see it. But this is crazy, five shots to the head at point blank range? I'm not sure if all these shots were fired by a single surveillance officer as someone suggested but but if all five came from the one officer then I have to say that I find that quite sickening. I assume they were carrying pistols and not semi-automatics?

[Biff]

Let me see - 'Foreign' looking gentlemen attempt to blow up yet more buses and trains in London. A 'foreign' looking gentlemen being observed to be acting 'suspiciously' is asked to stop by plain clothes officers I presume were shouting 'stop police' (a pretty universal command). 'Foreign' looking gentleman whose command of the English language is good enough for him to have worked for three years as an electrician in London, England thinks better of it, and runs, onto a train of all places. We'll probably never know why.

Fool. Sad none the less.

As for” gung ho cops” – I second the “grow up” suggestion. Particularly in the current climate for those people living in London, or anywhere in the world where there is a real risk of being blown up while going about your innocent days work/pleasure, and not in their cosy home and life thousands of miles away.

Let the official enquiry decide what went on, as if we can't already guess what was going through the cops head when faced with a 'foreigner' refusing to stop and running onto a train instead. The cop probably made a life changing decision in a split second. I imagine I would have done the same.

[curious george]

Well; you dont get work as a sparky in London without English, so one must assume he knew he was supposed to stop...
Quote"a 27-year-old Brazilian who had lived in London for the past three years and worked as an electrician"

and it sounds like it wasn't an impulse thing. They must have been chasing him for a while.." chased and fatally shot the man who had been under surveillance and refused orders to halt."

However, "The killing at point-blank range with five shots to the head"
Sounds pretty definite.
I guess they caught him, and just let rip. I can only hope he was a dodgy guy who had it comming, not some semi-dodgy guy in the wrong place at the wrong time...

And from the BBC:
1: Witnesses report seeing up to 20 plain clothes police officers chase a man into Stockwell Tube station from the street
2: One person says the man vaulted the automatic ticket barriers as he made his way to the platforms
3: The most direct route is via this escalator or the staircase that sits alongside it
4: Police challenge the man but he apparently refuses to obey instructions and after running onto a northbound Northern line train, he is shot dead

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "Explosives officers attended the scene. An initial examination suggests that the object may be linked to devices found at four locations in London on July 21.

Despite what his family say, sounds like something dodgy was going on.
If I hadda been a cop, it would have been easy to believe he was carrying the next bomb...

[El Dopa]

How?

How do you know he was an idiot?
How do you know he could have avoided it?

He was wearing "suspicious clothing"
He was behaving "in a suspicious way", having come out of a house under surveillance.

Looks like "suspicion" is enough these days to get you 5 bullets in the head...

Mike,

While I take your point, consider the facts, even though they are thin on the ground.

1) The police are keeping a house under surveillence, as they have reason to believe there a suspects connected to the recent attacks staying there.
2) They see a guy in a puffa jacket come out (bearing in mind it's the middle of a hot London summer).
3) They see wires coming out of the jacket.
4) They challenge him, which was probably along the lines of 'armed police, stay where you are'.
5) The guy runs into a tube station.

Is he going to detonate a bomb? Well, who knows? They had seconds to make a decision, if that. Do they want to take the risk of not shooting (and him detonating), or shooting, injuring him, but leaving him capable of detonating?

This was a bad situatuon that ended badly, but I think you're applying too generous a helping of hindsight.

We now know that the guy had lived in London for 3 years. You can't live there that long without picking up how things work. And Brazil is NOT Columbia, Peru or Chile, where running from the police may be the best option. It's a lot more stable that that.

So, yes, I'd say 'idiot' about sums it up. Although unfortunately, he's not going to be able to come to that copnclusion himself.

[soundbeltfarm]

i agree that the right thing was done.
the amount of bullets used, i agree again if he had explosives and was shot once he may have been able to detonate his bomb, bear in mind if they are prepared to kill them selves for the cause thats all they will think about if shot and still able to detonate their explosives. so killing him quick was a priorty.
London is a very twitchy place to be if you are an officer i'd reckon and i think they are doing all they can to look after their city and inhabitants.
This is my view on this matter with the knowledge we have of what went on.

[unhingedlizard]

Having been born near London and living there half my life this sort of thing isnt that new. The IRA have been setting bombs for decades there. The main difference now is that there are people willing to barge thier way onto crowded subways and blow themselves up. I grew up in the Air Force. Walking around on an air force base, not stopping when someone tells you to is enough to get you shot. I have utmost regard for those police officers who risked thier own lives to get down close to this person when there was a real possibility all he need to do was press a button and kill everyone around him. Well done lads. Anyone here who says otherwise needs to grew up and go spend a few weeks traveling in a place that is filled with people who have a real chance of ending thier lifes in the bottom of a pile of rubble caused by someone else deciding that thier cause is worth someone elses life.

[mstriumph]

In the best of all possible worlds it wouldn't have happened; but in the best of all possible worlds, there would have been no 'scenario' in which it could have happened.

The police were there - I wasn't; they had to decide - I didn't; I trust they did the best they could in the circumstances in which they found themselves with the knowledge they had available to them. That's all you can ask of anybody.

[Indiana_Jones]

the dude was like jumping over ticket barriers etc. I mean wtf? If I had armed cops chasing me, I'd fecking stop.
And I don't blame them for shooting them out. They've had enough, and it's a known tactic that they lure the cops in and then blow themselves up.

-Indy

[Timber020]

If he had been a bomber and detonated a bomb while they were trying to apprehend him an he killed a few people there would have been an outcry about that to.

wont be an open casket for that man.

[WINJA]

THE COPS DID THE BEST THEY COULD IN THE CIRCUMSTANCE , PEOPLE WHO ARE SHOT IN THE HEAD ONCE CAN LIVE AND BE COHERENT , 5 SHOTS WOULD LESSEN THE CHANCE OF DETONATING A DEVICE IF HE HAD ONE, THE COPS WERE ACTING IN THE INTEREST OF THE PUBLIC AND IT WAS QUITE BRAVE OF THEM TO CHASE DOWN WHAT THEY THOUGHT WAS A DANGEROUS MAN .
IF THE COPS SAY STOP AND PUT YOUR HANDS UP THEN MAYBE ITS BEST YOU DO IT .IF SOME ONE GOT SHOT IN BRAZIL BY THE PIGS THEY WOULDNT GIVE A FUCK SO I DONT KNOW WHY THEIR GOVERNMENT IS SHITTY

[parsley]

F***en gun ho police men, glad they don't carry firearms here because its just asking for them to be used they start reaching for them if you even think about resisting.

Most police in Britain don't carry firearms either. The only ones who do are specially trained firearm squads. I imagine it's the same in NZ.

[parsley]

The sad thing is the guy was obviously on the side of the angels:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4711639.stm

Gésio César D'avila, a friend and colleague, said Mr Menezes had considered alternative transport after the failed attacks on 21 July. "We were together on Thursday, and when we saw what happened, Jean said he wanted to buy a motorbike to avoid the tube," he said.

[MikeL]

wont be an open casket for that man.

You are a sensitive, sympathetic soul, aren't you?

[Hitcher]

If they hadn't held him down before unloading five caps into his head, I may have had a bit more sympathy for the cops on this matter. They were plain-clothes cops too.

I have a sneaking suspicion that if I was in a foreign country where the native tongue was not mine, where there had recently been terrorist bombings, and guys yelling and waving guns came running at me, that I may endeavour to run from them too.

High anxiety does strange things at times.

[MikeL]

Well I guess I'm heavily outnumbered on this one. Best thing would be to retire graciously from the debate...

But before I do, let me leave you with one question:

The "shoot first, ask questions later" policy was defended by the British lord who conceived it on the grounds of the "unique" circumstances which have apparently made it necessary. In what previous historical contexts have we heard similar justifications for contraventions of human rights?