BS: Update on the Stockwell execution

Subject: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 06:18 PM

Remember the young Brazilian, Jean Charles de Menezes, shot eight times in the head on a London tube while in police custody last month?

And all that stuff about how he'd brought it on himself by wearing a heavy jacket on a hot day and running away from a police challenge and jumping over a ticket barrier? An account and a rationalisation that was accepted at face value by a fair number of people on Mudcat (BS: Murder of the directly linked terrorist Fair enough, I suppose - after all, this was the account given by the police in press conferences and in the initial offical report to the coroner.

It now turns out that this was all total ruibbish. "CCTV footage and eyewitness accounts cited by ITV News show that the Brazilian was not wearing a padded jacket and walked calmly through the underground station barriers." See report today.

Jean Charles big mistake was to live in a block of flats (apartment building) where one of the other eight flats was under surveillance because it was believed that it was being used by a suspected would-be bomber, and to go to work that day by public transport. And to look foreign enough to be mistaken for one of the suspected bombers.

In all this one of the people I am most sorry for is the poor police officer who was so badly misinformed by his colleagues and superiors, and effectively compelled to execute a totally innocent man who was being held down on the ground with his hands grappled to his side.

Mistakes happen. But if the latest reports are true, I hope that the people who appear to have tried to misinform the public about this, in what seems to have been a callous and cold-blooded attempt to conceal the facts about this killing, will be identified and appropriately dealt with. And if that includes senior officers or politicians, "appropriately" would have to meant the end of their careers. (But of course it won't. If it comes to that, some poor sod much lower down will be selected to carry the can)

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 06:42 PM

Because of this kind of fiasco and cover-up, I am sorely tempted to believe that the police were looking for someone to kill whom they figured was a Muslim. Then they would be able to say they had killed one of the Islamic militants who are terrorising London, and nobody would ever have questioned whether or not it was true. It's only because the man isn't Middle Eastern, or Muslim, that the truth has come out. You can bet on that.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: CarolC
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 06:52 PM

And that also answers the question of why the police followed him for so long before murdering him. The obvious answer of course... so the maximum possible number of people could see them bravely kill this most dangerous and despicable man.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 06:53 PM

Frankly I don't know whose story to believe. Obviously the Brit authorities screwed up and cost a man his life. However, I was listening to BBC World Service the morning of the incident and there were numerous eyewitnesses, not police, who gave the same story. Either the Brits in that subway were victims of mass hysteria, or there is more to this story yet to be told.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 07:02 PM

It seems more likely that it was just a case of a cock-up by a panic-stricken bunch of police officers.

Set in motion by a completely bungled surveillance operation - apparently the man on duty watching the flat was "relieving himself" as Jean Charles de Menezes came out of the door of the block of flats, so he never switched on his video in time, just made a call to his team saying that someone who possibly might be the man the were looking for had left the flats.

From then on it just spiralled out of control in a kind of "Chinese Whispers" process in which a possibility was turned into a suspicion and ultimately into a false but definite identification as it passed along the line. And once there was a definite identification of a known bomber as jumping onto a tube train, the rest followed logically enough, in the circumstances of the day, a day after four failed bombings on three London trains and a bus.

But the lies about police challenges and heavy jackets and leaping barriers and runnig down stairs, they weren't mistakes, and I cannot see how any kind of excuse can be made for them.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 07:11 PM

Ron - true enough, the witnesses reporting a man jumping the barriers. Apparently the man seen was one of the police team in pursuit. An easy mistake for a member of the public to make, to assume he was a suspect being pursued - but the police would have known instantly that the jumping man had not been Menenzes. The same goes for the stuff about the "bulky jacket".

The police knew these things were not true, but they chose to go along with them. Even to the extent of misinforming the coroner.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: sapper82
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 07:29 PM

I had a VERY bad feeling about this when it was first on the news.
Rather than a conspiracy, I would favour the Cock Up theory with a strong element of a desire to be seen to be doing something.
I just hope to god there will not be any further cover-ups on this.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 08:12 PM

This link gives the ITV story; and with Windows Media Player you can see the actual reports.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 09:07 PM

"The police knew these things were not true, but they chose to go along with them."

Very good point. They could have cleared up issues instead of perpetuating them.

I think EVERYONE panicked that day, including the "eyewitnesses". I remember people talking about a man with wires coming out of his coat. I think people saw what they wanted.   

One thing I notice here in the U.S. is that the authorities in the U.K. seem to take forever before giving out any information.   On 9/11 the police spokespeople were giving whatever information they could.   From what I heard on BBC Worldwide, the authorities in the U.K. were remaining silent for hours, leaving the pundits and the public to spin out of control.

By the way, if anyone here in the U.S. gets XM Radio, I urge you to check out BBC Worldwide. It is a real eye-opener.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:25 AM

The issue isn't so much about delays in giving information - it's about rushing out misinformation, and then trying to cover up the actual facts. (And police in the UK aren't the only ones to go in for that. )

"Wires coming from out of his coat" - that would presumably have been based on a witness seeing some other passenger wearing an iPod or similar. Again quite a reasonable thing for an eye-witness to misunderstand, and pass on to some reporter, but something which the police could and should have corrected without delay.

Panic in a crisis can explain and even mitigate mistakes - but it can't in any way excuse deliberate attempts to mislead the public.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Grab
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:35 AM

It's only because the man isn't Middle Eastern, or Muslim, that the truth has come out. You can bet on that.

Do you regularly lose large sums at poker, Carol? A tip for you then - don't trust those "instincts" of yours...

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Tam the man
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 09:15 AM

the police that carry guns are volunteers, they are not forced to carry guns.

Why couldn't they have shot him in the leg or shot in some way to stop him, you don't have to kill them, and this isn't the first time, there was that Scotsman that was shot dead for carryinf a chairleg, police thar carry guns just like to use them or intened to use them.

Tam

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 09:33 AM

Why is everyone so surprised?
We were lied to before the war in Iraq. We were lied to during the war in Iraq. We have been lied to and treated with utter contempt over the "war on terror" by this govt.
Now we have been lied to over the murder of an innocent man by the authorities.

This country is now under a culture of lies spin and deception, which I'm afraid can be traced back to the birth of "New labour" and Blairs rule.

It is of course the fault of us all, we get the govt we deserve.

Stupidity and indifference elected Blair for a third term...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Tam the man
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:09 AM

You don't have to agree with me if you want

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 12:01 PM

Why couldn't they have shot him in the leg or shot in some way to stop him, you don't have to kill them,

Police protocol for suspected suicide bombers is to follow Israeli advice, and shoot to kill, to prevent them detonating anything. They have far too much experince of these attacks.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 01:02 PM

As McGrath has said,it's the attempt to cover up the mistakes which is unforgivable.
Can anyone put themselves in the place of the victim?
Held down in his seat and shot eight times in the head.
A completely innocent man, who had behaved in a normal manner, not jumping barriers or wearing "suspicious" clothing.
It could have been you or I, or any member of our family.

Heads must roll, and not just "PC Dimbleby"

Any BLAIR will do....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 02:10 PM

Kind of negates the idea that 'if you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear', doesn't it. We have the "Patriot" Act; stay tuned.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 02:13 PM

Do you regularly lose large sums at poker, Carol?

I never lose any money at poker, Grab. Not ever.


A tip for you then - don't trust those "instincts" of yours...

...and I know better than to take any tips from you.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 02:19 PM

I never lose any money at poker, Grab. Not ever.

Hmmm. I would love to have a game with you sometime!! I don't think I've ever met someone who NEVER loses at poker!

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 02:20 PM

You have to play poker to lose at it, Ron.

;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 02:39 PM

Ahhh!!!!   Good one!!!   :)

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: ard mhacha
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 03:36 PM

Thanks McGrath for this Thread, anyone who believes a Police or an Army explanation for their killing of a civilian would be very wise to wait until much later for the truth to emerge.

Having lived through years of Police and Army lies I quote you the "Daily Ireland" headline the day after the shooting quite simply it was, "Executed", well, they got it right first time.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 06:32 PM

A new market for "Bliar" T-shirts like this and this...

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Paul Burke
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 04:35 AM

shoot to kill, to prevent them detonating anything

Her's a hint for would be suicide bombers- make a 'dead man's handle' for your bomb- just a button that you have to press every 10 seconds say, otherwise the bomb goes off. Schoolboy electronics, cost a few pence.

I say this not to help the bombers, but so that if they adopt this, the police will have less motivation shoot people on suspicion.

I rather think the bombers would prefer to have everyone scared, not just of being blown up by the enemy, but shot by our own 'protectors' as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:12 AM

Whether we're ruled from London, Brussels, Dublin, Washington or whatever, it doesn't really matter - this is what we can expect. Jobs involving guns attract, among others, people with inappropriate attitude. And such jobs affect the characters of others. The UK was extraodinarily fortunate to manage for so long with an unarmed police force.

What is new in the western democracies, at least within my experience, is that Bush and even more so Blair have legitimised lying and deceit as never before. They have lied on one of the biggest issues imaginable, they have got away with it, and apart from a few Akenatons, few in their domestic audiences seem to mind that much. They can even pass themselves off as decent Christians.

In light of leaked evidence from the Stockwell inquiry it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the London police chief Sir Ian Blair was intentionally deceptive in his early statements after the incident. But he will enjoy prime-ministerial protection of course, because where would Tony be if people called Blair started resigning just for telling a lie or two?

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:56 AM

Yep, them Pig's jobs are so easy, don't understand how they could possibly foul up such a childishly simple operation. Time responsibility for all this prevention of terror stuff was handed over to Mudcatters, who clearly are great experts in the subject - far smarter than the Pigs - then we'll all be able to lie easy in our beds of a night.

NOT.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:21 AM

According to the BBC the police orders were to follow him and shoot if he started running.

His train was in the platform and he started running so he wouldn't miss it ...........

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 02:15 PM

Apparently the walk from the block of flats where Jean Charles was picked out to the bus stop takes more than five minutes. And then he had to wait for a bus. Then a bus ride taking 20 minutes during which he was observed. And no attempt whatsoever to stop him walking leisurely into the train station, picking up a copy of a free newspaper to read on the train, and go down the escalator.

How this squares with the fact that the orders of the day were reportedly (and sensibly) to intercept as soon as possible away from the immediate address, and not to allow the person suspected to get into any station...

It is hard to escape the conclusion that some pretty incompetent police work was involved. It doesn't in any way help the police to try to evade that, or to try to conceal the errors - in fact doing that makes the work of the police a lot harder.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 04:23 PM

How would this leak affect things?

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 05:52 PM

Guest, I'm assuming the leaked information is correct (if not my view would be rather different) but given the state of this country, it probably affect things in that we will have a new form of terrorism defined, one whereby who ever leaked this information is found guilty of high treason.

Tony Bliar and the lying culture he supports will doubtless come out of it unscathed.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: greg stephens
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 06:54 PM

CarolC's theory that they followed him for a long time to get a big audience when they killed him is interesting. So how many people were actually watching in that carriage on the tube? Would this really be the most populous place in London? I am not an experet on London(perhaps CarolC is) but I can think of better places to get a big audience than inside a carriage on the tube.
    And, please, the old canard is so popular now, "the wicked police made up a lie about his bulky jacket to justify killing him". Now, this is a murky story, but surely it is obvious to anyone(except the usual suspects green lizard brigade) that this this description came from an eye-witness that was passed to the press and widely circulated. It may have been total bollocks(presumably he confused the victim with an officer in a flak jacket), but it was "evidence"(ie: what a witness claimed). Absolutely not a police fabrication.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:32 PM

But it was "evidence" that, right from the very moment Jean Charles was shot, but they did absolutely nothing to set the record straight, but rather colluded in spreading it, and in confirming it, by a failure to speak up. (Even when the allegations were contained in reports given to the coroner, which would have been seen by the police.)

If someone hadn't blown the whistle and leaked the documents this week, none of this would have been in the public domain, or admitted to the family, for many months, quite possibly for quite a few years.

I quite agree with greg that the idea of a deliberate conspiracy to kill a random foreigner, to show willing, doesn't stand up. But there is plenty of reason to suspect the existance of a conspiracy to blur and conceal the facts about what happened.

It seems possible that one reason for that might have been some idea that revealing the truth about the catastrophic bungling in this episode couls have the effect of making people less likely to be open with the police. I mean, how confident would you feel about passing on some slight suspicion you had about a neighbour or a colleague, if you thought that some hit squad was going to leap on them in a public place and execute them without any further investigation? (Of course in some cases where that would be the intention of the informant. I somehow don't see that as too helpful to any fight against terror either.)

But the trouble with that is, there had in fact already been allegations published from the family and others which had asserted that the stories about Jean Charles leaping that barrier and wearing a heavy and suspicious jacket. The true version would have surfaced, but in a way that maximised distrust of the police.

A police force that makes mistakes is one thing - a police force that engages in a conspiracy to conceal those mistakes is something else.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:32 PM

Greg, are you suggesting that we have armed police officers who are unable to distinguish between a denim jacket and this "bulky jacket" and have to rely on "police evidince" after putting 8 bullets in the poor fucker's brains?

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:33 PM

Sorry, missed my name above.

Subject: RE: BS: Update on the Stockwell execution
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Aug 05 - 10:48 AM

One bizarre thing is that the reason given for there being no CCTC record of what happened in Stcokwell is that on the previous day, after the failed bombings, the police had removed the discs from the recorders, to look at them, but had not ensured that new discs were inserted.

The family's representatives have described the police activity in this case as "Laurel and Hardy". I think Keystone Kops is more appropriate. But what is really strange is that in the way they dealt with the earlier bombings they had done a pretty good job.