Member

We have had the same issue of police responses to terrorism in London. The Metropolitan Police have a policy, first enunciated by Sir John Stevens, now the noble Lord, Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, that armed officers must shoot to kill if they believe that someone is trying to detonate explosives on their body or in a vehicle. I know that this can lead to horrible mistakes, as with Jean Charles de Menezes, a Brazilian electrician mistaken for a suspected Islamist terrorist, who was shot dead by armed police officers on a tube train at Stockwell station in my former constituency. That was a terrible tragedy. None the less, there was never a suggestion that the officers concerned or the commanders—who included, ironically, Jon Boutcher, now the chief constable of the PSNI—should be charged with murder. Will the Minister insist on, and will His Majesty’s Government assist in, a judicial review of this judge’s shocking decision, as a matter of urgency?