17 Jul 2006

The ongoing secrecy surrounding the police shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes last year is grossly unacceptable and dangerously undermines public confidence, Liberty warned today.

The Crown Prosecution Service has announced that it will prosecute the Metropolitan Police under the Health and Safety Act 1974 but will not pursue criminal charges against individual officers in the shooting death of de Menezes. Nearly one year after his death the Independent Police Complaints Commission’s report has yet to be published. 
 
Liberty said that the speed of the present system is untenable and called for an urgent Privy Council review of police procedures. 
 
Director of Liberty Shami Chakrabarti said: 
  
"Nearly one year after the Stockwell tragedy, it is grossly unacceptable that there is still no proper public account of what took place. We are very disappointed by the length of time the combined efforts of the IPCC and CPS continue to take.” 

“Suggestions that the Metropolitan Police Commissioner has yet to be interviewed as to what he knew and said about the shooting such a long time ago are equally disturbing. Such delays help neither the difficult work of the police nor public confidence in secret procedures for the use of lethal force.” 
  
“There may be little alternative but for an urgent Privy Council review of the ongoing operational procedures themselves." 

Contact Jen Corlew on 0207 378 3656 or 0797 3 831 128 
  
NOTES TO EDITORS
 
1. On 22 July 2005, Jean Charles de Menezes was shot seven times in the head by police marksmen who had mistakenly identified him as a terror suspect. He was an innocent Brazilian man working as an electrician in London. ENDS///