A leaked police investigation report into the killing of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes is taking curious twists and seems to be coughing up more questions than answers.
It’s already been noted that the initial witness statements suggesting Mr Menezes vaulted the ticket barrier to get into the station may have been incorrect and that the witness actually saw a pursuing police officer vaulting the barriers.
Witness statements and photographs from an independent police investigation leaked to ITV News also show that Jean Charles de Menezes did not run away from police at Stockwell Tube station in South London and was wearing only a denim jacket before he was shot dead on July 22.
Then, it seems, the officer watching Menezes’ flat was taking a leak when Menezes left and nobody checked to see whether the man they were following resembled the alleged bomber they were keeping under surveillance.
Gold Command at the Yard which was running this operation, declared a “code red” and handed responsibility to CO19 - the firearms team. The armed team had been given photographs of the alleged bombers, yet no one realised that Senhor de Menezes bore no resemblance to any of those men.
The photo (right) shows Menezes to not be wearing the thick coat that was originally claimed but, instead, a denim jacket. Further, new witness statements suggest Mr Menezes was actually sitting down by the time police reached his carriage.
…a surveillance officer guided four armed police into the same carriage in which Senhor de Menezes took his seat.
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 also reveals for the first time that a member of the surveillance team, who sat nearby, got involved and grabbed Senhor de Menezes before he was shot: “I heard shouting which included the word ‘police’ and turned to face the male in the denim jacket.
“He immediately stood up and advanced towards me and the CO19 officers …I grabbed the male in the denim jacket by wrapping both my arms around his torso, pinning his arms to his side.
“I then pushed him back onto the seat where he had been previously sitting … I then heard a gun shot very close to my left ear and was dragged away onto the floor of the carriage.”
Somebody has to quickly round up the facts of this matter and put them into the open because it’s all smelling pretty rotten. What started off as a hideous mistake (in most people’s eyes) is now becoming something even more sinister. If the police are to maintain credibility we need to hear the truth - however bad it is - rather than leaked snippets that contradict the currently understood version of events. We need confidence in our security services and this isn’t fostering much of it.
Its only sinister in the way that it is constantly relayed to us. What happened REMAINS a very tragic mistake by police officers. These remain officers doing their jobs in unchartered territory, asked to make decisions none of us would want to make, facing a totally new threat to our security. They are using unreliable intelligence - had he had a valid visa he would be alive - and on top of this we expect them to be above and beyond in their ability to make decisions. How is that ‘rotten’? Its certainly wrong what happened and it needs to be brought to debate when we have all the facts but given this is a new era we operate in, im not so sure it is right to call the mistakes rotten. We still do not know what really happened. Surely the full report will give us facts from which the police can learn, isnt that what is was supposed to do?. How does it help to leak stuff into the public domain? The police are right to be silent until we have the facts presented to us. No more rushing to appease the media please. It remains, to me at least, a tragic tragic set of circumstances forced upon us by wider issues. What is truly sinister is trial by media. A victim culture perpetuated by the media has meant we need fast unsubstantiated answers - resulting in a Commissioner having to face the media before he himself even had the facts, ridiculous stories put out by the family themselves, grossly unreliable witnesses who ’saw it all’ spewing rubbish to the tv cameras and a media circus that will ensure an officer doing his job will ‘pay’. I wonder how much of this is about learning to deal with these circumstances better in the future or how much is about making the police look as rotten/incompetent as possible?
Comment by AF — August 17, 2005 @ 10:52 am
It is certainly an issue for the media, as some of the innaccuracies are from “selected” witnesses. These were reported as fact. Note that the family were told directly by the police that the victim was not wearing a “bulky jacket”. But the press just ignored them.
Mature journalists know the police make up evidence rather a lot when under pressure, hence the need for so many enquiries. To then carry on this sham debate about “stopping possible al-Qaeda suicide bombers” when no such thing has been proven to exist is the worst outcome.
Comment by DE — August 17, 2005 @ 11:25 am
I agree the media circus around this has been the main factor in the inaccuracies. Im not sure i understand your second point. What sham debate regards stopping possible suicide bombers? a) it is important to debate best methods for stopping suicide bombers if detected in situ on tube trains and buses to avoid another July 7 b) suicide bombers do exist. If you mean the al-Quaeda link is tenuous then i disagree. Al-Qaeda is an ideology more than anything else and influences people in their choices to carry suicide missions.
Comment by Alex — August 17, 2005 @ 1:34 pm
The need for enquiries i think lends weight to the argument that the officers did what they thought to be right at the time. Given that armed officers have to follow guidelines and orders, they know full well that their actions, even more so at that time, would be scrutinised by the media and in the event of any wrongdoing the IPCC would be involved. There is CCTV on the tube and in the station, radio communications etc that will all form part of any enquiry whether the guy was innocent or not. Part of the insatiable public desire to string ‘em up wherever possible means they would have acted in full knowledge that the outcome would be highly scrutinised. Im not sure how any officer could make it up as he went along and expect to get away with it and so doubt this is the case. The media and ‘mature journalists’ on the other hand make it up as they go along all the time and are accountable to noone. Trial by media as above is wholly wrong and by far the biggest sham. It is awful they are to be possibly held up as ‘murderers’. Also a sham.
Comment by Alex — August 17, 2005 @ 2:13 pm
My references to ‘rotten’ don’t concern the initial police action - that was simply tragic and I for one am glad it’s not me in those situations having to make those decisions. I do not have it in for the police even if I don’t think they’re above criticism.
I am more concerned about the subsequent confusion over a story that has almost turned on its head. When the stakes are so high we need some certainty.
I wonder if the police ought simply to refuse to speak on demand to the media about such things. Maybe they should make it known that there will be a 7 day cooling-off period after major incidents such as this so that they can at least garner some basic facts themselves.
Because, assuming no conspiracy, it seems the Commissioner got his story wrong almost from the statrt. In such circumstances that’s not acceptable. If he feels the media put him under pressure to produce instant facts before he’s actually in possession of them then maybe he needs to lay down the law (no pun intended) and tell them he’s got some checking of his own to do before he can start talking to the world about it.
GM
Comment by Administrator — August 17, 2005 @ 2:32 pm
The media and the do-gooders wont let them/him. Even though that sounds like a good idea in theory. Whatever he does the Commissioner is attacked. For example, refusing to comment on the ‘facts’ today meant he was under scrutiny yet again even tho’ they asked to wait for the full facts to be pusblished. So then the media leak out information about the Commissioners letters to the home office forcing him to come out AGAIN and speak before all the facts are clear. His statement is now that he wished to concentrate on aprehending the bombers and not the IPCC case first, which makes total sense but is being held up by the media and attacked. In such situations the media and the do gooders always forcing answers far too quickly. Its a witch hunt and has been from the start.
Comment by Alex — August 17, 2005 @ 2:57 pm
Alex - the decision to use a shoot to kill policy is based entirely on the premise that there are many coached suicide bombers roaming around. In Israel this is a recorded fact, in the UK it is not. All we have is one incident as yet not fully explained, some copy cat flour bombers and no mastermind. The existence of al-Qaeda as an “ideology” surely can’t form public policy.
We are left with a discredited police service, a dead Brazillian and no further knowledge of what exactly happened and who if anyone is responsible for 7/7.
Comment by DE — August 17, 2005 @ 3:02 pm
I think the police service are far from discredited having apprehended all of the July 21 bombers. I for one dont go all out for the benefit of hindsight makes me holier, approach. I tend to consider how hard it must have been in those few minutes at Stockwell and not want to chuck the first rock at them. Also, I gather bombs nowadays can be made from any number of simple ingredients and since im no expert i wouldnt belittle a flour bomb. Clearly you know more about bombs than i - please do share. Im baffled at your assertions that the ideology of al-qaeda shouldnt form the basis of public policy in light of July 7 and September 11. And who is responsible for July 7? - the bombers themselves - Or is it too much to ask that we should actually determine that the people who blew themselves up and 50 odd people are responsible (and that they might just have been inspired by Sept 11 amongst other things?) Shall we go along with you and hope noone else jumps onto a tube train, ticking, sometime soon? It only takes one suicide bomber to kill a lot of people. You are one of those people who need several thousand people to die before you wake up and realise we are facing a real danger from any single moron with a chip on his shoulder.
Comment by Alex — August 17, 2005 @ 5:59 pm
@DE
“It is certainly an issue for the media, as some of the innaccuracies are from “selected” witnesses. These were reported as fact. Note that the family were told directly by the police that the victim was not wearing a “bulky jacket”. But the press just ignored them.”
Not quite, they quietly retracted at a later date. This has been the pattern ever since 7/7 - the media has been full of various BS stories which have been quietly retracted a day or two after (never with the prominence of the original BS, of course). Very reminiscent of the warm up to Iraq, where “Saddam” and “Al Qaeda” were mentioned as often as possible in the same sentence, and you had to read the fine print to realise that there was no link.
After the tube shooting it was also striking how the media was the next day full of CCTV pictures of the flour bombers. Another pretty obvious attempt at media management by waving the terrorist bogeyman in everyone’s face….”Nothing to see here! Boo! Terrorists!”
@AF
“Its only sinister in the way that it is constantly relayed to us. What happened REMAINS a very tragic mistake by police officers.”
Hardly. At best it is gross, and institutionalised, incompetence. At worst it was a planned execution - and still grossly incompetent. More power for these clowns? I don’t think so.
Hell, the “police marksmen” couldn’t even get more than 70% of shots on target at point blank range.
Comment by Frank O'Dwyer — August 17, 2005 @ 8:51 pm
Alex,
Can your ignorence be genuine?
Al Qaeda is a strategy of Power.
All the real facts and evidence validate this
reality.
The mythical Al Qaeda is a figmant of media imagination and readers who have no political memory.
Every court case that attempts to prosecute
members of Al Qaeda has evaporated into a farse
and no prosecutions ever result.
Robin Cook, now deceased, wrote in a column recently that “Al Qaeda” is the Data Base of intelligence assets on the payroll of US and British agencies. Did you not read this?
No judicial examination of Sept 11 2001 has ever been conducted. The information available renders the “official” theory a lie.
Many survivor families are fighting in court to achieve an independent investigation.
Alex, seven of the 911 hijackers are alive.
Can you not research and think.
Bush did not move from the school he was visiting on the morning of 911 so his handlers MUST have known he was safe from attack.
There is no other intelligent explanation.
Larry Silverstein has confessed that WTC 7 was imloded by controlled demolition following discussion with fire dept authorities. {PBS Doco]
The whole story is riddled with lies and absurdities.
Alex, are you aware of the war game exercises that were drilling the possibility of planes crashing into buildings on the morning of 911?
Ther were several “drills” underway on 911 that were simulating hijacking terror scenarios. This confusing circumstance provided the cover to make possible the 911 event.
This was perplexingly repeated on 7/7 by the Power drills.
Alex, are you aware that none of the videos and audio “Al Qaeda” media sensations have been validated. Some have been pronounced fraudulent by experts in that area of expertise.
What does all this mean?
Alex, you deride trial by media yet you have condemned the 7/7 four as AL Qaeda Bombers on the strength of media reports that have regularly been later proven lies.
The same Ian Blair that has misled the public on the train shooting incident is our “authority” on the 7/7 events.
We now have this recent episode demonstrating that the very agencies charged with the task of getting to the truth have been allowing a fantasy to be weaved in the media which conveniently includes an apologetic theme for the shooters.
Alex, how do we know the new story is any more reliable than the old story?
Once a liar, always under suspicion.
There is nothing yet presented that explains why this man had to be killed.
It is murder to kill innocent people.
Of course with careful manipulation of the public mind and useful apoligetics regularly
presented, just as we see here, a population can be conditioned to accept that killing must be tolerated because of the “new” situation faced by that nasty evil “Al Qaeda”.
As long as the public “believe” the nightmares
will be employed to assist the accelerating progress of the policy of Monopoly.
Comment by Christopher Brooks — August 17, 2005 @ 10:10 pm
Frank - ‘at worse a planned execution’.. of a suspected terrorist. Not an innocent man. ‘Institutionalised incompetence’. This is a new situation so it hardly qualifies as institutionalised. Every situation is new and demanding for these officers and when they screw up they know it will be pulled to pieces - i doubt they make decisions lightly. That it is right and fair to run an enquiry and ensure we keep innocents from dying is an absolute necessity. But to dismiss them so readily without any understanding of what they do is wrong. I dont claim to have the answers on how these officers should have handled that situation having never had to make such an awful decision. I would really want to know from you what your VIABLE EXPERIENCE BASED solution is to all this.
Comment by Alex — August 18, 2005 @ 9:57 am
I feel this will turn out to be ‘cock up’ rather than conspiracy. I detest Labour but I don’t believe they have a plan for us that involves shotting innocent people and, as Alex says, the police can’t pick their noses without filling in a form and then being subject to some scrutiny committee.
I think the problem is that, the moment something goes horribly wrong, the first question asked isn’t ‘Oh no - what did we do wrong?’ but ‘Oh no - how can we avoid being hung, drawn and quartered in public for this?’
Thereafter, the train of misinformation, speculation and news ‘management’ chuggs out of the station and on its merry way…
GM
Comment by Administrator — August 18, 2005 @ 1:27 pm
As long as most Brits are apologists for the lies of our government agencies the truth will remain obscure.
Where is the strident call for a transparent investigation which must include all of the recent Bombing events?
Comment by Christopher Brooks — August 18, 2005 @ 7:52 pm
Alex - “‘at worse a planned execution’.. of a suspected terrorist. Not an innocent man.”
A suspect is IN LAW an innocent man. Jean Charles de Menezes was IN FACT an innocent man.
I expect EQUAL justice under the law.
That means suspects get a fair trial, not vigilante “justice”.
And that means policemen can get tried for murder.
” I would really want to know from you what your VIABLE EXPERIENCE BASED solution is to all this.”
Solution to what? An extremely rare type of attack that kills and injures many orders of magnitude less people than diet, smoking, alcohol, road accidents, and much more besides?
Besides, someone who says ‘don’t do something stupid, unnecessary, ineffective, and immoral” doesn’t need to come up with an alternative. The alternative is not to do the something stupid.
BUSH: I propose that we change RED traffic lights to BLUE!
DEMOCRATS: That’s ridiculous, blue is too close to green, people would get confused. And why do we need to change it anyway? You’re not making any sense at all.
BUSH: There you go again, criticizing my plan without offering an alternative.
DEMOCRATS: The alternative is to NOT change red to blue. Keep it red.
BUSH: That’s not an alternative. That’s what it already is, red.
DEMOCRATS: We don’t want to change it to blue, there is no reason to.
BUSH: No reason? Innocent Americans are killed in traffic accidents every day! They should be changed to blue! Also I propose that we won’t wear any pants!
DEMOCRATS: Not w– you said not wear pants? I don’t–
BUSH: Once again, the democrats are criticizing my not wearing any pants plan without offering an alternative.
DEMOCRATS: But… the alternative is… wearing pants.
BUSH: That’s not an alternative. An alternative is like, we’ll wear shorts, or we’ll wear clownpants or something. I already said no pants.
DEMOCRATS: I don’t… are you– I mean I guess we could pull them down part way or something.
http://www.livejournal.com/users/tongodeon/259489.html
Comment by Frank O\'Dwyer — August 18, 2005 @ 7:56 pm
I still havent had an answer to a real problem. We had suspected terrorists on the run & living in Stockwell who they day before had attempted to to set off a bomb in Stockwell and who lived in the same house as the innocent man in Stockwell. I know he is IN FACT and IN LAW an innocent man. But he was suspected of being a terrorist. How would YOU propose we apprehend such suspects to protect the other commuters on the tube who are also IN FACT and IN LAW (whatever that meant) innocent. Im tired of hearing from those who dismiss the police as ‘vigilantes’ because they CANNOT suggest any viable solution to a REAL problems which KILLED 50+ innocent people and maimed a lot more - namely STOPPING a suspect who possibly has his finger hovering over a detonator or mobile phone. Correct me if im wrong - did July 7 happen recently or is it a figment of my imagination.
Cue Christopher.
Comment by AF — August 19, 2005 @ 3:19 pm
“I still havent had an answer to a real problem”
You still haven’t provided a real problem.
By the way, the police have had the powers that have you in such thrall since before 7/7.
Didn’t help, did it?
“But he was suspected of being a terrorist.”
So what. If I suspect you of being a terrorist, can I blow you away? After all, maybe you have a nuclear weapon. So if you are killed, MILLIONS of lives will be saved!!! Spot the flaw.
This was not a killing in self-defence or in defence of others. Even if they’d had the right man - and (besides being wrong) they had the thinnest of evidence on which to conclude they had - there was no evidence the guy was about to kill anybody.
No bag, no bomb, no detonator, no bulky coat, no “mobile phone” (which don’t work very well on tubes).
You might want to google the term “dead man’s switch” also.
“IN LAW (whatever that meant) innocent”
It means innocent until proven guilty. You can read about the concept in history books.
Comment by Frank O'Dwyer — August 19, 2005 @ 7:47 pm
I dont need a history lesson thanks my inference was someone is innocent until proven guilty or.. they explode! Spot the flaw. And that is the real problem Frank. Im surprised you assert mobiles dont work on the tube when the NYPD/NSY released information stating that this was they believe the detonator(s) used on July 7. Can you fit a nuclear bomb under your jacket? Has anyone done that then? No this, no that… all benefit of hindsight, lucky you Frank. Having read the brave officers statement in the papers yesterday, it made me realise what difficult times we live in and the challenges these officers faced. i cant see how they can be paraded as evil murderers and hung out to dry by people like you.
Comment by Alex — August 19, 2005 @ 8:58 pm
What we seem to be avoiding here is the honesty of the people who we depend upon for our security. This question is covered well in the following article.
http://www.williambowles.info/
My question still remains unanswered. Are there any “real” terrorists?
What is the exact nature of the threat to our security?
When do we get a judicial investigation?
Do we still support the rule of law?
Comment by Christopher Brooks — August 20, 2005 @ 1:38 am