Documents leaked last night from the police investigation contradict almost everything the London cops have said about the de Menezes shooting (thanks, Vijay). The current London shoot-to-kill policy now seems like a loose cannon.
The docs say that de Menezes was captured on tape walking into the tube station at a normal pace, picking up a free newspaper, using a tube card to enter and only breaking into a jog at the platform to catch a train. He was wearing a lightweight blue denim jacket (see photo) and was not carrying a backpack. Before getting onto the tube, he took a leisurely, 15-minute bus ride from his apartment to the station, not noticing that he was being tailed by cops. He did not look at all South Asian. Witness statements corroborate the tape.
It’s not clear whether the cops even identified themselves to de Menezes and warned him not to enter the tube. If the leaked docs are accurate, it appears that the only reason the cops killed him is that he emerged from the wrong apartment building. But it’s easy to understand the mistake:
The documents… suggest that the intelligence operation may have been botched because an officer watching a flat… was “relieving himself”. [Link]
One officer reportedly said he “checked the photographs” and “thought it would be worth someone else having a look”. However, he was unable to video the man for subsequent confirmation because he was “relieving” himself at the time. [Link]
Smells like a coverup. What it all means for people with brown skin living under an ill-defined shoot-to-kill policy:
“… he was just unfortunate to be living in a block of flats that was under surveillance and to look slightly brown-skinned…” [Link]
Be careful out there. Details below.
… the lawyers representing the family of Jean Charles de Menezes, say that documents leaked from the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) investigation into the shooting show that “virtually the entire body of information” released by the police has, until now, been false… Photographs and witness statements imply that… de Menezes, 27, did nothing to suggest that he might be a suicide bomber before he was seized by police officers and shot eight times…
In a further contradiction to initial police reports, witnesses said that de Menezes was wearing a lightweight jacket and behaving normally in Stockwell Tube station, South London, picking up a free newspaper and swiping his season ticket at the barriers, only breaking into a run when his train pulled into the station.
Early police reports had said he had been wearing a bulky coat which could have hidden an explosives belt, and “behaving erratically” when he vaulted the ticket barriers at Stockwell station and ran onto a crowded train. [Link]
Mr de Menezes was filmed on CCTV cameras entering the station at a normal walking pace and even picking up a free copy of the Metro newspaper. He was wearing a denim jacket. His family’s solicitor, Harriet Wistrich, said the disclosures meant police had no reason to suspect Mr de Menezes was a suicide bomber, beyond the fact that he came out of a house under surveillance…
“He was not carrying a rucksack. He simply had a denim jacket. Was it necessary to shoot him dead as opposed to trying to confront him at an earlier stage. There was no indication he was about to blow himself up at all […] Had the normal procedures taken place in which a warning is given and officers wear specially marked clothing then this young man may not have been killed.” [Link]
The leaked documents now suggest the Brazilian had walked into Stockwell Tube station, picked up a free newspaper, walked through ticket barriers, started to run when he saw a train arriving and was sitting down in a train when he was shot. [Link]
CCTV footage is said to show the man walking at normal pace into the station, picking up a copy of a free newspaper and apparently passing through the barriers before descending the escalator to the platform and running to a train. He boarded a Tube train, paused, looking left and right, and sat in a seat facing the platform. [Link]
Update: More from the Guardian:
It has now emerged that Mr de Menezes:
· was never properly identified because a police officer was relieving himself at the very moment he was leaving his home;
· was unaware he was being followed;
· was not wearing a heavy padded jacket or belt as reports at the time suggested;
· never ran from the police;
· and did not jump the ticket barrier…CCTV footage shows Mr de Menezes was not wearing a padded jacket, as originally claimed, and that he walked calmly through the barriers at Stockwell station, collecting a free newspaper before going down the escalator. Only then did he run to catch the train… A senior police source last night told the Guardian that the leaked documents and statements gave an accurate picture of what was known so far about the shooting…
But the revelation that will prove most uncomfortable for Scotland Yard was that the 27-year-old electrician had already been restrained by a surveillance officer before being shot seven times in the head and once in the shoulder… “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 on to the seat where he had been previously sitting … I then heard a gun shot very close to my left ear…” [Link]
