Suspected bomber was from Brazil

[JQ Public]

Police: Brazilian shot not tied to bombs

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Police say the man they shot dead at a London Underground station was a Brazilian national "not connected" with this week's attempted bombings on the city's transit system.

London police identified the man as 27-year-old Jean Charles de Menezes.

"For somebody to lose their life in such circumstances is a tragedy and one that the Metropolitan Police Service regrets," the police statement said Saturday.

During a news conference following Friday's shooting, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair said "this shooting is directly linked to the ongoing and expanding anti-terrorist operation."

Despite the apparent setback, Blair said Saturday he was pleased with the probe and the work that investigators are doing.

"I think the Metropolitan Police [are] performing absolutely outstandingly, and I'm very proud of them," he said.

De Menezes on Friday left a south London apartment building that had been under surveillance as part of the investigation into the attempted bombings Thursday.

Officers followed him to the Stockwell Underground station. The man's "clothing and suspicious behavior at the station added to their suspicions," a police statement said.

He challenged police and refused to obey orders before he was shot and killed Friday morning, Blair said Friday.

A witness to the shooting, Mark Whitby, said he was sitting on the train when "I heard a lot of shouting."

"I saw a chap run on to the train," Whitby said. "He was running so fast he half sort of tripped. He was being pursued by three guys. One had a black handgun in his hand."

"As he sort of went down, two of them sort of dropped on to him to hold him down, and the other one fired. I heard five shots."

Meanwhile, police said Saturday that a second suspect had been arrested in connection with the attempted bombings.

The man was arrested in Stockwell on Friday night by anti-terrorism officers, police said.

The first arrest came Friday in the same neighborhood.

Police said the two detained men, who have not been identified, were to be questioned Saturday.

The arrests came after police released images of four men caught on closed-circuit television at sites where and around the time the attacks were attempted.

On Saturday evening, police mounted an armed raid in South London near the Oval Underground station, where one of the attacks took place Thursday. Police said no arrests were made in the raid.

Friday's shooting is a rarity in London, where police generally are not armed except for special response units.

The latest attacks came two weeks to the day 52 people were killed in four bombings targeting the city's mass transit.

As in the July 7 attacks, three subway trains and a double-decker bus were attacked, but in Thursday's case, the four homemade bombs stuffed in backpacks only "partially detonated," said Assistant Police Commissioner Andy Hayman.

One person was wounded. (Full story)

Hayman said police searched three locations Friday, one in West London. Scotland Yard identified the area "in West Kilburn, W9." Police cordoned off part of Harrow Road in that area.

[streetsoldier]

(a) Why did the man jump the turnstile and run into one of the cars, even though he was told to stop several times by uniformed police? What was he trying to hide?

(b) Why was it necessary to shoot a suspect who was already "in custody" (held down)? Could the London constabulary have used tasers, or other non-lethal means?

[BEER980]

Well if he was not armed and they were wouldn't you run. Maybe he had some gambling debts or was involved in the drug trade. He might have had some kind of a bad trip going on. Sometimes people panic and we may never know why he spooked. The whole bombing story is looking like a fish market.

[Brent]

Something here doesn't make sense...

RUNNING into a subway wearing a trenchcoat in July???

I don't get it.

The new policy the police over there have is going to cause more of these incidents I'm afraid. People need to slow down and not be running onto a train acting suspiciously.

[streetsoldier]

Having been a cop, I'd know better than to run from them. Besides, I'd have no reason to do so.

[P.K.]

(b) Why was it necessary to shoot a suspect who was already "in custody" (held down)? Could the London constabulary have used tasers, or other non-lethal means?

How easy is it to set off a bomb though once you get onto the tube? Had he not run onto there this wouldn't have happened.

They probably don't have tasers, they have only been trialed in a few areas. It is rather unusal to have armed police walking about like this in the first place.

[Aslkahuna]

The Police at the time thought they were dealing with a person with a bomb so they shot him to prevent him from possibly detonating it. Whatever the situation, the guy panicked for some reason and when all shreds out we might find out what it was.

Steve

[JQ Public]

july in london is different from july in alabama. From what i heard it was only in the seventies that day. THe fact that they were all plain-clothes police officers does make it a little more plausible that he ran. Either he was visiting the area on vacation and didn't understand the language too well or he ran with the rest of the group thinking they were after someone else. He tripped and fell and they still shot him ?5? times? What ever happened to shooting someone in the foot? I think some folks need a geography lesson.

[BEER980]

He was not a tourist he lived and worked there. Perhaps he wore the trenchcoat for his job some days. He might have had to do some work underground where it might be cooler. We need a few more pieces to the story.

Shot man not connected to bombing

Jean Charles de Menezes (far right), pictured with friends

A man shot dead by police hunting the bombers behind Thursday's London attacks was a Brazilian electrician unconnected to the incidents. The man, who died at Stockwell Tube on Friday, has been named by police as Jean Charles de Menezes, 27. Two other men have been arrested and are being questioned after bombers targeted three Tube trains and a bus. Police also said a suspect package found in north-west London on Saturday may be linked to Thursday's attacks.

'Tragedy'

Scotland Yard said Mr Menezes, who lived in Brixton, south London, was completely unconnected to the bomb attacks and added: "For somebody to lose their life in such circumstances is a tragedy and one that the Metropolitan Police Service regrets." The Brazilian government has expressed its shock at the killing and Brazil's foreign minister Celso Amorim is on his way to London to get an explanation from foreign secretary Jack Straw.

In a statement the government said it "looks forward to receiving the necessary explanation from the British authorities on the circumstances which led to this tragedy". The shooting is being investigated by officers from Scotland Yard's Directorate of Professional Standards, and will be referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission. The family of Mr Menezes told the Brazilian media there was nothing in his past which would give him a reason to run from police.

Mr Menezes' cousin, Alex Alves, told O Globo television: "I asked that the body be released as quickly as possible, we need to bring him to Brazil, which is what the family wants".

"He does not have a past that would make him run from police," he said.

Mr Alves said Mr Menezes, who was from the city of Gonzaga in Minas Gerais state, had lived in London legally for at least three years and was employed as an electrician. Civil rights groups have called for a full inquiry into the shooting. Meanwhile Dr Azzam Tamimi from the Muslim Association of Britain told BBC News the police should review their procedures. "Frankly it doesn't matter whether he is a Muslim or not, he is a human being.

"It is human lives that are being targeted whether by terrorists or whether in this case unfortunately, by people who are supposed to be chasing or catching the terrorists." The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said: "The police acted to do what they believed necessary to protect the lives of the public. "This tragedy has added another victim to the toll of deaths for which the terrorists bear responsibility."

[BritBob]

They won`t shoot him in the foot, legs or wherever. They were led to believe this guy had a device on him. Shooting him in the legs, feet etc would still have left him able to trigger a bomb still. Maybe a tazer would have left him able to move somewhat? I guess the UK police have taken a leaf out of the Isreali security forces book.

It was a terrible tragedy, but the police cannot be blamed for carrying out their job. They have been approved to use a shoot to kill policy, which incidently will stay according to the Met chief. If anyone is to blame, the intelligence was floored. The security services are not fighting armed troops, these are guys dressed much like you and I, that blend in with society. Unfortunately the killing of an innocent man won`t be the last and this is another `feather in the cap` for the terrorists. Personally, from what I`ve seen in the media, the police and security have done a remarkable job over there.

[JQ Public]

I'm sure it was on video surveillance. It'd probably make it out on the news at some point?

[JQ Public]

" Innocent man's 26-minute journey to a violent death
Correspondents in Sao Paulo and London
July 26, 2005

IT took 26 minutes for Jean Charles de Menezes to get from his flat in Tulse Hill to the entrance of Stockwell Tube station. In that time, the 27-year-old electrician did not appear to realise that a team of 30 Scotland Yard officers was following his every move.

Police were staking out the red-brick block of flats in Scotia Road, London, after the address had been found in documents left in one of the rucksacks abandoned after the failure of last Thursday's attacks.

There was also evidence that the crop-haired bomber in the sweatshirt with a New York logo on the front, seen in CCTV pictures fleeing Oval station, had recently stayed at the address.

There are eight separate flats in the block. When Mr de Menezes emerged from the communal front door just after 9.30am, the police must have realised from the photographs they carried that he was not one of the four bombers.

Even so, they decided that he was "a likely candidate" to follow because of his demeanour and colour, so one group set off on foot after him.






As he waited at a nearby bus stop, the reconnaissance team sought urgent instructions on whether to challenge him or let him board a bus. They were worried about the bulky, padded jacket he had zipped up on such a warm morning.

The decision was taken to let him go, in the hope he might lead his shadows to the bombers. Mr de Menezes was heading to Willesden Green to fix an alarm system. After surviving the crime-ridden slums of Brazil, London seemed the perfect, peaceful place for him to start a new life.

When it was obvious he was getting off at Stockwell Tube station, the team on the bus alerted a three-man team of marksmen to move in. The decision was taken at Scotland Yard that he must not be allowed to get to the platform.

The marksmen were told: "If you think he has explosives under his coat and he fails to heed shouted warnings, then you must shoot to kill." As the three plainclothes officers closed in, they say they screamed their first warning that they were armed police. They say he turned, ran into the station concourse, vaulted the ticket barriers and reached a waiting train before they could catch him. They shot him five times in the head when they believed he was trying to trigger a bomb.

His cousin, Alex Alves, claims Mr de Menezes was "playing around with a friend in a game of chase outside the station".

The police insist he was alone during the entire journey.

By far the most controversial claim is from several witnesses who cast doubt on police statements that they shouted a warning or identified themselves before firing.

Lee Ruston, 32, who was on the platform, said he did not hear any of the three shout "police" or anything like it. Mr Ruston, a company director, said he saw two officers put on blue baseball caps marked "police" but that the frightened electrician could not have seen that because he had his back to the officers and was running with his head down.

Less than a minute later, Mr de Menezes was pinned to the floor of the carriage by two men while a third fired five shots into the base of his skull.

His parents, struggling to understand why their generous and loving son was killed, have demanded a public inquiry into his death.

Maria de Menezes, his disabled mother, speaking from her home in Brazil, said: "Jean went to Europe to work, that is all. He went there for his family, to send us money. I feel like my heart has broken into a thousand pieces. I can't believe my son will never walk through our door alive again."

Mr de Menezes, 27, known as Jem to his friends, was one of two children born to a farming family in Gonzaga, a 5500- strong mining village 800km northeast of Sao Paulo, Brazil's biggest city. "

[Hurricaneman]

Its come to this, that makes me sick

[∞]

Another potential problem with trying to use a tazer to subdue a suspect that could be wearing an explosive device is the electric shock from the tazer could potentially detonate the device.

[Brent]

They won`t shoot him in the foot, legs or wherever. They were led to believe this guy had a device on him. Shooting him in the legs, feet etc would still have left him able to trigger a bomb still. Maybe a tazer would have left him able to move somewhat? I guess the UK police have taken a leaf out of the Isreali security forces book.

It was a terrible tragedy, but the police cannot be blamed for carrying out their job. They have been approved to use a shoot to kill policy, which incidently will stay according to the Met chief. If anyone is to blame, the intelligence was floored. The security services are not fighting armed troops, these are guys dressed much like you and I, that blend in with society. Unfortunately the killing of an innocent man won`t be the last and this is another `feather in the cap` for the terrorists. Personally, from what I`ve seen in the media, the police and security have done a remarkable job over there.

Exactly what I was going to say...