'More Could Be Shot' - Met Chief
'More could be shot' - Met chief
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...urce=&ito=1490
11:30am 24th July 2005
Scotland Yard Commissioner Sir Ian Blair has admitted more people could be shot after his officers gunned down an innocent man in their hunt for would-be suicide bombers.
He apologised to the family of Brazilian electrician Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, but said there would be no change to the police shoot-to-kill policy.
Mr de Menezes was executed by undercover armed detectives who shot him in the head at point blank range on Friday morning as he tried to board a Tube train at Stockwell, south London.
His furious family branded the police "stupid and incompetent" and the Brazilian Government said the British had made a "lamentable mistake".
Mr de Menezes had left a small block of flats in Tulse Hill, south London, which was under surveillance because of a suspected link to the attempted bomb attacks on three Tube trains and a number 26 bus last Thursday.
He caught a bus the few miles to Stockwell Tube where he was challenged by officers but, according to witnesses, he bolted down an escalator. His bulky clothing added to suspicions that he might be a suicide bomber and police followed him on to a train and shot him dead.
Alex Pereira, 28, a cousin of Mr de Menezes, who was called "Jim" by his English friends, said he had been working legally in Britain for three years and was thought to have been on his way to repair an alarm in Willesden Green when he was shot. He was from Sao Paolo and his family, including his elder brother and his two retired parents, still live in Brazil.
The flat he left on the morning he was shot was shared with his two cousins Vivian and Patricia.
Sir Ian apologised to the family but defended the actions of his officers, saying: "This is a tragedy. The Metropolitan Police accepts full responsibility for this. To the family I can only express my deep regrets."
He said the "shoot-to-kill in order to protect" policy for dealing with suspected suicide bombers would continue, saying: "We have to take this tragedy, deeply regret it and move on to the main investigation which is proceeding at an extraordinary pace."
