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[Centipede]

[OT] Guns & Knives

[Centipede]

[maevey]

This article here describes how upon further investigation many of the initial witness statements were flawed:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4177082.stm and Menezes hadn't been acting suspiciously.

The police officers involved were not regular police but were anti-terrorism officers who carry guns in certain situations

[ryandrew]

[locqust]

The problem with the entire debate on this guy is this.

The police get criticised for shooting him, head shot so they don't hit the bomb or make the hand reflex and set off the deadman switch. Turns out he isn't a bomber.

Or

They get criticised for doing nothing and we end up with another repeat of July's earlier bombings.

Which do you think was the wise choice giving what we know was the sequence of events leading to his death?

[oliverkeers13]

OK: Couple of facts:
1. He paid for a ticket
2. He didn't vault the barrier
3. He was wearing normal, summer clothes. No heavy jackets.
4. The policemen were plain clothes. If some man with a gun starts screaming at you, you're going to run.
5. Menezes was sitting on the train, next to another police officer involved in the operation when his killers boarded the train.
6. Menezes was brought under control and restrained.
7. He was then shot 7 times in the head. Usually, 1 shot to the head is enough to kill.
8. 11 shots were fired. 11. 4 bullets missed at point blank range. Do you really trust these people to only hit the "bad guys" from a decent range if they can't hit a man lying down underneath them?

[locqust]

Thats a couple?

I thought they had confirmed in the final report he was wearing a coat? Maybe not the heavy jacket originally said granted.

A single head shot will not always kill, there has been many reports of that over the last 20 years. But, still, your right 7 shots is a tad excessive.

You are right though about the plainsclothes bit, I think anybody would run if a random guy starts waving a gun at you for no reason, I think as many as he had pointing guns at him is def gonna scare you!

The problem with the entire thing is though that if you have 20 witnesses your going to have 20 different stories. No-one is ever going to tell what really happened because they won't remember all of it. Lets face it, would you remember seeing a guy walking past you wearing normal clothes in London or anywhere busy? You won't notice anything until you start hearing the commotion. The only people who know all of what really happened are the police and Menezes.

[oliverkeers13]

If you saw a man getting shot, you'd recall the few moments before it. Also, the "Jacket" was a typical, light, Denim Jacket. Urban Cowboy.

[GasparLewis]

You see, America doesn't have to deal with all of this nonsense, because our cops just shoot whenever they think they can get away with it and worry about scandals later, if it all.

*inhales deeply through his nose*

The smell of justice!

[ramsfan]

A tip for how to deal with plain clothes policemen carrying guns and survive. Many years ago i was travelling around Italy looking like a scruff. I think I bore a resemblance to the red brigade, or whatever they were called, who were said to be on the run around Italy at the time. I was stopped by a very smart man in a suit with what I took to be a machine gun. He had a few friends with him. He challenged me by pointing the gun at me on Reggio station. The stiff upper lip comes out of the genes at such moments. I inspected his ID to see if it said mafia killer on it. He then subjected me to an aggressive search, until he came across the molten pack of butter in my pack side pocket. That was enough. Terrorist or not, he wasn't going to get his suit dirty. This may only work in Italy.

[Scott]

[European Chris]

[Centipede]

[Rob_Riv]

It was one officer firing, also he had apparantly been sleep deprived due to having working very long shifts because of the heightened security.

[Reddog]

From my understanding they were firing low velocity rounds, since it being a public place and all, rounds going through body and hitting innocent bystander isn't good, neither is bone. Both of which do happen. Its also my understanding that the weapon hasn't been identified, but it is possible that the one in question was a Glock 18c, an automatic, rather than semi, so 11 shots is quite possible given a struggle. bear in mind that even with the best shot in the world, if you're on top of (probably) struggling man, who you believe to be carrying a bomb, aren't you going to make absolutely sure??