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De Menezes verdict 'disastrous'
02/11/2007 14:10 - (SA)
London - Mayor Ken Livingstone called the
conviction of London's police force in the De Menezes killing
"disastrous" on Friday and said the verdict would make it more
difficult to defend the capital against terrorist attacks.
Police would now be frightened of any potentially wrong
decisions made in the heat of the moment, he told the BBC.
His comments came after the Metropolitan Police were fined
£175 000 on Thursday for putting the public in danger when officers mistakenly shot dead innocent Brazilian man, Jean
Charles de Menezes.
The 27 year-old electrician was shot seven times as he
boarded an underground train in South London two years ago after
being mistaken for a suicide bomber.
Met Commissioner Sir Ian Blair has defied a barrage of calls
for his resignation from opposition politicians, fellow officers
and media commentators but retains the support of Prime Minister
Gordon Brown.
The Metropolitan Police Service had denied the charges,
brought under health and safety regulations.
Livingstone, who was mayor when suicide bombers killed 52
people in London on July 7 2005, condemned the verdict.
"As the law now stands based on this court case, an officer
has got to have at the back of their mind ... the implications
of this judgment in the sort of situation that might occur
again," he said.
"I think this is disastrous.
"If an armed police officer believes they are in pursuit of
a terrorist who might be a suicide bomber and they start making
these sort of calculations based on this, how is this going to
be seen? Am I going to be hauled off to court?
Such cases only took away the funding for more officers on
the beat.
"At the end of the day mistakes are always going to happen
in wars or situations like this," Livingstone said.
"The best you can do is to try and make the potential and
the risk the minimum possible. But there will be mistakes."
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