Man running from police shot dead in London

CaptSolo · 22-07-2005 03:29PM

roberteboot wrote:

But he wasnt restrained.Eye witness reports say they shot him as he stumbled onto the train.Earlier on the BBC site eye witness reports said that they stumbled onto him.The site then seemed to take this to mean restrained for some reaon.

Presumably they would have loved to take him alive and question him.But they couldnt.If they shot him once and he still had any ability to he could still detonate the bomb.

BBC says:

"One of them was carrying a black handgun - it looked like an automatic - they pushed him to the floor, bundled on top of him and unloaded five shots into him.

"I saw the gun being fired five times into the guy - he is dead," he said.

Seems like they had him on the floor - that was also what was said on BBC News. Just a couple of thoughts:

1) what was said here ealier on - about "dead man's switch".

some are misunderstanding it for a simple switch to activate a bomb by pressing it. but, as I understood from the original comment here, it is a switch that activates by _letting_it_go_. so what if the guy had such a device and police shot him dead? they would have detonated the bomb by shooting him.

2) is there information if that guy had any explosives on him?
if he did not and he was a suspect, police has lost a valuable lead.

3) there was a very cynical report on the TV:

BBC Home affairs correspondent Margaret Gilmore said officers had challenged a known suspect they had been following.

"He ran, they followed him. They say they gave him a warning, they then shot him.

"They brought in the air ambulance. They did everything they can to revive him. He died at the scene."

Shortly before the report an intelligence consultant said on BBC News that the policy for suicide bombers was set to 'shoot to kill' and that law enforcement would have to shoot in the head to avoid detonating explosives.

Now, if they shoot him 5 times in the head, what ambulance and what 'did everything to revive him' is she talking about? Bull****!

[ If they did not shoot him in the head, how about the explosives he might have been carrying? ]

Regards,
CaptSolo

The General · 22-07-2005 03:36PM

egan007 wrote:

You should go - it's unlikely that anything will happen to you
If people start not going because of this then the people putting bombs there win...

why don't you go, let us know how you get on

Sherlock · 22-07-2005 03:38PM

"Widespread panic is probably inevitable, though I'd say due less to the actions of terrorists and more to the uselessness of the government in telling the people what's going on."

The shooting only happened this morning, no one can be sure about what happened so how can the British government be blamed for lack of info. Of course any panic is caused by these terrorists targeting the tube, how can the government be blamed. Whats going on is that muslim terrorists have decided to kill ordinary people for their own objectives.
Given yesterdays events and the bombings of two weeks ago I won't blame the cops for shooting him, these bombers are quite happy to blow ordinary people to bits so I won't shed any tears for them.

roberteboot · 22-07-2005 03:40PM

CaptSolo wrote:

BBC says:

Seems like they had him on the floor - that was also what was said on BBC News. ]

Which is why i posted a retraction of sorts.Its a few posts before this.Earlier reports had indicated they shot him as they were chasing him and he "stumbled onto the train".
So i was going on the assumtion that he was trying to get on the train to detonate it.But im sort of changing my mind now.

Zaphod B · 22-07-2005 03:44PM

I won't shed any tears either Sherlock, as long as the dead man is a bomber and the police don't start shooting innocents. And how can the British government be blamed for not telling people what's going on? Because they're the government. The average man on the street doesn't know what's going on. The prime minister should. If the police shoot a man dead, the government should be able to find out whether they shot him running onto a train or lying down with their guns to his head, and whether the man had a bomb or not, and release that information reasonably quickly.

CaptSolo · 22-07-2005 03:49PM

roberteboot wrote:

Which is why i posted a retraction of sorts.Its a few posts before this.Earlier reports had indicated they shot him as they were chasing him and he "stumbled onto the train".

So i was going on the assumtion that he was trying to get on the train to detonate it.But im sort of changing my mind now.

I see.

All this sounds very strange. They could prove they had a case which required killing the suspect for public safety, to protect even more people.

But if they were following him from the house, then it's not as the big overcoat and big bag suddenly appeared on him while he was walking on the street. If they saw enough danger, they should have stopped him earlier.

IF they expected him to leat to his boss, did they expect him to walk all the way on foot. Chances are he would have taken the bus or the tube anyway.

And... they say about strong belief he is a suspect in yesterday's bombings. But those are beliefs and a suspect is a suspect until really proved he is the one who did this. Suspection may be enough to question somebody, but is it enough to shoot to kill? [Assuming they had a chance to intercept him on the way from home to the tube station].

Regards,
CaptSolo

Ancient1 · 22-07-2005 03:51PM

At the moment it looks unlikely that it was the police, a theory suggests that special forces were involved.

"Even Special Branch and SO19 (Scotland Yard's armed unit) are not trained to do this sort of thing.

"It's plausible that they were special forces or elements of special forces."

Interesting article here.

Sherlock · 22-07-2005 04:07PM

Where are the people who were previously posting that it was their belief that the British security forces committed the 7/7 bombings to divert attention from G8?, What was the motivation behind the last 2 days attempted bombings?

DJDC · 22-07-2005 04:16PM

I cant believe some of you people.why are you so concerned about some scumbag bomber rights when he was clearly involved in all this this jihad rubbish. :mad:
the police,especially the plain clothes ones are highly trained and well informed.they arent going to just shot someone by accident or for the laugh.the guy was a threat.the threat has now been removed.london is safer for it.all this over protection of civil liberties and rights lead to this mess in the first place.will people ever wake up and realise these people want to kill me and you and every other infidel.it is a very serious threat and must be dealt with accordingly.

Zaphod B · 22-07-2005 04:38PM

From the BBC website:

"I have just had one phone call saying, 'what if I was carrying a rucksack?'"
- Inayat Bunglawala, Muslim Council of Britain

What if you were carrying a rucksack? Well, I wouldn't recommend running away from heavily-armed police/special forces trained to kill...

GreeBo · 22-07-2005 05:21PM

Zaphod B wrote:

What if you were carrying a rucksack? Well, I wouldn't recommend running away from heavily-armed police/special forces trained to kill...

A man dressed in plain clothes is holding a gun and shouting something at you in a language that you dont understand.
I'd run away. :cool:

CaptSolo · 22-07-2005 05:30PM

Zaphod B wrote:

"I have just had one phone call saying, 'what if I was carrying a rucksack?'"
- Inayat Bunglawala, Muslim Council of Britain

What if you were carrying a rucksack? Well, I wouldn't recommend running away from heavily-armed police/special forces trained to kill...

Indeed. It's also valid what next poster said about running away from men in plain clothes shouting something in a language you don't understand.

Info from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4703853.stm

1700: Police sources say the man shot at Stockwell was not one of the four men whose photos were released earlier in connection with Thursday's blasts.

Regards,
CaptSolo

Zaphod B · 22-07-2005 06:15PM

Heh well I half agree with the running away bit. Personally if someone threatened me with a knife I'd run away. If they threatened me with a gun I'd freeze, possibly sh!t myself and do whatever the hell they wanted.

At my job I've had two attempted robberies. The second of these was successful. A man came in, placed his folded jacket on the counter and then put his hand inside it, telling me he had a gun. He moved his hand so I could see he was holding what looked like the grip of a handgun. Now since he had the 'gun' covered, it's almost certain that he had a BB gun or possibly an air pistol rather than a real handgun. But I didn't think that at the time. I thought "sh!t, sh!t, sh!t", and after a few seconds came to my senses and gave him what little I had in the till, after which he promptly ran away - I never found out if the gun was real or not, though I doubt it. In any case, I didn't think of running away. Actually that's not true - I thought about it for about a quarter of a second, before realising that I can't outrun bullets. Now that's just my experience, and I'm not suggesting my reaction to that would be the same as other people under different circumstances. But I think most people's reaction to guns would be very different to their reaction to knives or clubs - in other words, I think most people would, like me, realise "I can't outrun bullets".

Also it's worth bearing a couple of things in mind - one, the question was in English. Even if the guy who asked it did not speak fluent English, it's fair to assume that most immigrants in the UK at least understand the word "Police". Two, if there were several very well-armed men (not just one!) shouting orders (even if I don't understand a language I can usually understand the difference between an imperative and an insult) I would probably assume that they weren't from the local division of the BNP.

Cake Fiend · 22-07-2005 06:34PM

Let's look at the facts from various news sources:

The man was a known bombing suspect, had been under surveillance and had been tailed from his home
He was wearing an unusally large coat and carrying a rucksack
He was running to a tube train after very recent bombing attempts on tube trains
He ignored police challenges
Police were authorized to shoot bomb suspects to kill

It's clear that this man was suspected by police of being involved in recent bombings, was dressed suspiciously given the temperature and aforementioned bombing involvement, was challenged by police, ignored this, continued to run from police (who had presumably identified themselves as such) and ran onto the tube. The armed police following him to the train clearly thought he had a bomb under his jacket or in the rucksack and thought he might detonate it (on an occupied train carriage).

Regarding the fact that the man was pushed to the ground then shot five times, I'm going to go with the opinion of a trained police officer (in what he most probably thought was a split-second, life or death situation) over any conjecture by anyone on these boards.

BuffyBot · 22-07-2005 06:55PM

A man dressed in plain clothes is holding a gun and shouting something at you in a language that you dont understand.

How do you know he doesn't understand the language. Given the profile of the previous attackers, it's likely that any other bombers would be British born.

CaptSolo · 22-07-2005 06:59PM

Sico wrote:

Let's look at the facts from various news sources:
The man was a known bombing suspect, had been under surveillance and had been tailed from his home

(+) The suspect was not one of 4 men on CCTV footage from previous day's bombings

He was wearing an unusally large coat and carrying a rucksack

He was running to a tube train after very recent bombing attempts on tube trains

He ignored police challenges

Police were authorized to shoot bomb suspects to kill

In other words:

Police tailed a known suspect of bombings, wearing an unusually large coat and carrying a rucksack all the way to the tube station and let him get into the station and jump a train before shooting him dead.

P.S. Latest update: 18:54: Police say the man shot at Stockwell had been followed by surveillance officers because he had emerged from a house linked to the investigation into Thursday's blasts. They say the man is still subject to formal identification.

So the reason they followed this man is he emerged from the wrong house. Nothing in their information shows that they knew the man was on the scene of bombings, etc - that they did know of involvement of this person apart from exiting this house when it was under surveilance.

This certainly can be a reason for arresting him, but why tail him to the tube station and kill him there?

Regards,
CaptSolo

Dinner · 22-07-2005 07:26PM

CaptSolo wrote:

In other words:

Police tailed a known suspect of bombings, wearing an unusually large coat and carrying a rucksack all the way to the tube station and let him get into the station and jump a train before shooting him dead.

We can onmly assume that they followed him in the hope that he was going to go to "The Boss'" house or meet him in London somewhere, if they did that then they could have had a possible contoller/bomb maker.

They took a gamble, it didnt pay off. So now they'll just have to go one of the many other routes to try get to the bottom of the situation.

Dinner · 22-07-2005 07:29PM

GreeBo wrote:

A man dressed in plain clothes is holding a gun and shouting something at you in a language that you dont understand.
I'd run away. :cool:

What about 10 armed men shouting "Police get down". I'd say there are very few people that wouldnt understand that. And even fewer that new it was wrong to run into a tube with people chasing you.

drdre · 22-07-2005 07:31PM

guys i think thats very wrong that they killed someone as sky news said he was only a normal person and not a terrorist. his poor family has just lost there kid:mad:

Cake Fiend · 22-07-2005 09:53PM

drdre wrote:

guys i think thats very wrong that they killed someone as sky news said he was only a normal person and not a terrorist

Got any links? Because Sky were saying earlier that the guy was under police surveillance for suspicion of involvement in the previous bombings. Seems a bit o dd that an ordinary Joe Bloggs would be surveilled, tailed, then would run from armed police.

JackKelly · 23-07-2005 12:58AM

If what i've heard is true, the police should be ashamed. In the name of public safety or not.

From what i heard, the man was confronted and than made a run, tripped on the ground, two of the police grabbed him...and another proceeded to stick the gun in him and shoot him 5 times. He had no rucksack or bag. He may have been wearing a big jacket, but tbh he couldn't have been looked upon as a potential suicide bomber. It seemd obvious he was just trying to get away, not blow up a train.

On a more an intelligence note, if they had captured him and he did turn out to be involved, he would have been very useful for information.

county · 23-07-2005 01:07AM

TimAy wrote:

If what i've heard is true, the police should be ashamed. In the name of public safety or not.

From what i heard, the man was confronted and than made a run, tripped on the ground, two of the police grabbed him...and another proceeded to stick the gun in him and shoot him 5 times. He had no rucksack or bag. He may have been wearing a big jacket, but tbh he couldn't have been looked upon as a potential suicide bomber. It seemd obvious he was just trying to get away, not blow up a train.

On a more an intelligence note, if they had captured him and he did turn out to be involved, he would have been very useful for information.

until we get the facts how can you comment,but if the police did not act and he did blow himself up and innocent by standers your first statment would still be the same[the police should be ashamed]dammed if they do,dammed if they dont

stagolee · 23-07-2005 05:40AM

these are eyewitness reports from bbc news

Commuter Anthony Larkin, who was also on the train at Stockwell station, told 5 Live he saw police chasing a man.

"I saw these police officers in uniform and out of uniform shouting 'get down, get down', and I saw this guy who appeared to have a bomb belt and wires coming out and people were panicking and I heard two shots being fired."

and

Mark Whitby said: "I was sitting on the train... I heard a load of noise, people saying, 'Get out, get down'.

"I saw an Asian guy. He ran on to the train, he was hotly pursued by three plain clothes officers, one of them was wielding a black handgun.

"He half tripped... they pushed him to the floor and basically unloaded five shots into him," he told BBC News 24.

"He [the suspect] had a baseball cap on and quite a sort of thickish coat - it was a coat you'd wear in winter, sort of like a padded jacket.

"I didn't see any guns or anything like that - I didn't see him carrying anything. I didn't even see a bag to be quite honest.

quite a difference betweent the two

JackKelly · 23-07-2005 10:03AM

well they said at first that "he was directly linked to the bombings of the previos day" than they changed that to "he wasnt directly linked but was a terrorist" and now the headline of the irish times says again "he is directely linked"

Wertz · 23-07-2005 05:38PM

Just been listening to the BBC R4 news on which a "formal apology" has been issued by the Metropolitan Police.
Deep regret, saddened, etc...
The guy was followed from a building under suspicion since the 7/7 attack...when challenged he ran and was shot in the circumstances already mentioned.
The statement also states that the man was NOT involved in any terrorist attack, nor was he in possesion of any device(s).
Nothing online yet, but should update pretty soon.

The British security forces have operated a shoot to kill policy for decades now...in the current climate of fear and panic, we can likely expect a lot more of this type of incident...fortunately it's only Arabic looking people that need worry :rolleyes:

ExoduS 18.11 · 23-07-2005 06:29PM

roberteboot wrote:

Five times.Once.What does it matter.They stopped him from killing people.Im sure the people on the train he was running towards wouldnt mind if they shot him all day long!I cant believe people are talking about it being over the top!

No offense but the police are meant to have some restrain to there actions, i bet some of the iraqi people wouldnt mind seeing the american or british souldiers mutilated all day long either. One bullet at point blank range to someones head will kill them, it was definately over the top and unprofessional !

Kare Bear · 23-07-2005 06:33PM

No offense but the police are meant to have some restrain to there actions, i bet some of the iraqi people wouldnt mind seeing the american or british souldiers mutilated all day long either. One bullet at point blank range to someones head will kill them, it was definately over the top and unprofessional !

Rubbish, if you thaught someone was gonna blow you to pieces you'd want to make sure there dead.

Wertz · 23-07-2005 07:06PM

Man shot dead NOT connected to bombing
No, not OTT at all then :rolleyes:

Villain · 23-07-2005 07:41PM

What I'd like to know is why they let him get as far as the tube station, they had his house under survalliance because one of the rug sacks that failed to explode on thursday had his address in it. He was followed when he left his house, he got a bus to the tube station and only was only after he had entered the tube station that the officers identified themselves, surely they should had arrested him before he got on the bus???

The Muppet · 23-07-2005 07:53PM

While the loss of life is regrettable the guy should have obeyed the police orders when he was confronted. Failing to do so left the police with no option but to shoot him dead. Their primary duty was to protect the other people on the train which they did. Had he been geared up as a Human Bomb and had he been giving time to detonated it the Police would be facing criticism for not taking more stern action. Extraordinary threats require extraordinary measures to deal with them.

Man running from police shot dead in London

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