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London shooting inquiry prolongs family's pain

Harriet Wistrich & Asad Rehman

THE FAMILY of Jean Charles de Menezes has waited almost a year to find out that no officer will be charged in relation to his shooting. How can someone have been killed so deliberately and no individual be held accountable?

Some say the decision of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to charge the London Metropolitan police under health and safety legislation is at least a step forward from the usual impunity offered in police shootings. But such a prosecution could prove a bad outcome for the family. Not only is it a woefully inadequate response to the gravity of the crime, but it adds insult to injury by denying the family access to the evidence of how Jean died for another year or more. The prosecution conducted by the CPS will mean that the family only has access to the evidence at the same time as the rest of the world. All under a law which does not allow for anyone to be held accountable for their actions, and does not require the police commissioner to account for his organisation's policies.

For this reason the family will push for the inquest to take place before any health and safety prosecution.

The CPS' three-page letter of justification for its decision also raises more questions than it answers. It is asserted that the evidence supports the firearms officers' account that they believed they were confronted with a suicide bomber who was about to detonate explosives. The account, which has not been tested in interview (it is believed the officers declined to answer questions) and is contradicted by other witnesses, means that self defence cannot be disproved. Even if it is true, no consideration is given to whether the officers acted negligently or recklessly. If they were told Jean was a suspected "suicide bomber," what made them think that he posed a threat at that moment? By the time he was identified, he was dead.

Some in the police service wish to portray Jean's death as either a mistake or the price we must get used to paying because the rules of the game have changed. But by allowing the bullets that ended his life to also claim the fundamental principles of the right to life, justice, truth, and equality, we allow the impression that these rights do not apply to those with dark skins or beards. And that undermines our only real weapon against those who wish to harm us: a united British community.

(Asad Rehman is a spokesman for the Jean Charles de Menezes Family Campaign; Harriet Wistrich is a solicitor acting for the family.)

Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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