Do note innocent bystanders are acceptably expendable too.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22989-1742008,00.html the family speaks link

Family of innocent Brazilian demands answers from police over his shooting (Filed: 18/08/2005) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ news/2005/ 08/18/nmenez118.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/18/ ixnewstop.html

Lawyers for the family of Jean Charles de Menezes yesterday set out a series of key questions that they said must be answered by the inquiry into his death. Some of the detail is now clearer following the leak of confidential documents, photographs and witness statements. But gaps remain that the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which is conducting the investigation, will be expected to fill.

How was Jean Charles de Menezes first identified as a suspect and on what basis?

 

09:33: He leaves Tulse Hill

WHAT IS KNOWN: The police, who were searching for four men suspected of trying to detonate explosives on the London transport system on July 21, had placed a block of flats on Scotia Road, Tulse Hill, south London, under observation as a result of information found at one of the bomb scenes.

They believed that the nine flats contained one or more of the alleged terrorists.

At 9.33am on July 22, Mr de Menezes left the block and went to a nearby bus stop. Police saw him and, judging him to be of Asian appearance, suspected him to be one of the terrorists.

No positive identification was made because an officer was relieving himself at the time. According to the leaked documents, the officer said: "As he walked out of my line of vision I checked the photographs and transmitted that it would be worth someone else having a look.

"I should point out that as I observed this male exiting the block I was in the process of relieving myself.

"At this time I was not able to transmit my observations and switch on the video camera at the same time. There is therefore no video footage of this male."

Why was he allowed to board a bus without challenge if he was indeed a suspect?

 

09:40: He boards a No 2 bus

WHAT IS KNOWN: One of the leaked witness accounts says: "De Menezes was observed walking to a bus stop and then boarded a bus, travelling to Stockwell station. During the course of this, his description and demeanour was assessed and it was believed he matched the identity of one of the suspects wanted for terrorist offences.''

Why was he allowed to continue his journey unchallenged if he was a suspect?

 

10:02: He gets off in Stockwell

WHAT IS KNOWN: Mr de Menezes was not intercepted on the bus. It is believed he was followed by plainclothes police officers and was allowed to travel unmolested in the hope that he could lead them to other suspects. In fact, he travelled to Stockwell Tube station.

At some point on this journey it was decided that he should be prevented from getting on a train. This decision will have been taken by Cdr Cressida Dick, 44, the Oxford-educated member of the Met's specialist crimes directorate. She was the so-called Gold Commander running the operation from Scotland Yard.

Why was he allowed to board an Underground train if he was a suspect?

 

10:05: He enters the tube station

WHAT IS KNOWN: Mr de Menezes used his Oyster travel card to enter the station and made his way to the platform, where a train was waiting to leave. He got on and sat down. It is possible that armed response teams had arrived too late to stop him getting into the station.

When did police identify themselves to him and how?

WHAT IS KNOWN: All the officers were in casual clothes. However, a member of the surveillance team has said in a witness statement: ''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 SO19 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 on to the seat where he had been previously sitting. I then heard a gunshot very close to my left ear and was dragged away on to the floor.''

However, the instructions issued to armed surveillance teams, known as the Operation Kratos guidelines, state: ''It is vital that you take no action that would alert a suspect to the fact that they have been identified by police.''

What opportunities were afforded for alternative action?

 

He boards the train and is grabbed by police and shot seven times

WHAT IS KNOWN: If armed officers in pursuit of a suspected suicide bomber believe that he is about to detonate a bomb or refuses to comply with police requests, he can be shot in the head. Kratos guidelines say that a shot to the body could detonate any device strapped to the torso.

''If the subject was non-compliant a critical shot may be taken,'' the guidance states.

What other means of incapacitating a suspect were available on that day? If alternative means were not available, why not? If they were, why were they not used?

WHAT IS KNOWN: The S019 officers who followed Mr de Menezes are members of an armed unit and carry pistols and automatic weapons. When one of the London bomb suspects was arrested in the West Midlands the following week, he was incapacitated using a Taser weapon that fires an electric charge of 50,000 volts into the victim without killing him.

Sir Ian Blair made it clear that he did not favour such a tactic.

He said: ''It was an incredible risk to use a Taser on a suicide bomber because the Taser itself could set it off and that is not the policy. I can't imagine how that was used. We use Tasers in London regularly but a Taser sends electric currents into the body of somebody; if there is a bomb on that body, then the bomb can go off.''

Where did a "shoot to kill" policy emanate from and on what claimed legal basis? What public debate and democratic accountability surrounded the coming into being of that policy?

WHAT IS KNOWN: It has always been the case that if armed police feel their lives or those of members of the public are in danger they can, and must, shoot to kill.

In the light of the terrorist threat, these guidelines were refined by Lord Stevens, the former Met commissioner. He said: "We are living in unique times of unique evil, at war with an enemy of unspeakable brutality, and I have no doubt that now, more than ever, the principle is right despite the chance, tragically, of error."

Sir Ian, who took over the post this year, concurred. He said the policy was the "least worst" way of tackling suicide bombers and refused to rule out other innocent people being shot in similar circumstances.

"I am not certain the tactic we have is the right tactic but it is the best we have found so far."

Why was the suggestion that five bullets were fired allowed to continue as a public assertion, uncorrected, when there were eight?

WHAT IS KNOWN: Only when the inquest was opened into Mr de Menezes's death did it become known that more than five shots had been fired. He was shot seven times in the head and once in the shoulder. It has now been disclosed that 11 shots were fired by two police officers. The three other bullets missed their target.

Why did Scotland Yard allow a number of assertions, now known to be untrue, to stay in the public domain?

WHAT IS KNOWN: Earlier statements that Mr de Menezes was wearing a padded winter coat at the height of summer, thereby arousing police suspicions, continued to be repeated for several days even though he was, in fact, wearing a denim jacket.

The original suggestion that he was wearing a heavy fleece seems to have come from a witness on the train, Mark Whitby, but the Met never corrected this.

It was also suggested, initially in a statement issued by Scotland Yard, that ''he vaulted over the ticket barrier, ran downstairs and on to a Tube, where it appears he stumbled''. It now transpires that he was acting like a normal commuter, using his travel pass, and hurrying towards the train only to avoid missing it.

According to the family's lawyers, the pathologist conducting the post mortem examination on Mr de Menezes's body was told five days later that he had vaulted the ticket barrier and run, even though CCTV cameras apparently show he made his way slowly down the escalator.

''Why was he not told the facts which clearly by then [July 27] must have been available,'' the lawyers asked.

GM~Who? Us lie? You must be mistaken!