Stand-Offish wrote:
I did answer it somewhere I believe.
I have no qualms about how they stopped the taxi. They thought that the best way to proceed and I agree.
What would I have done?
I'd have had my officers behind their cars with their weapons aimed at Duggan.
I wouldn't have approached the taxi.
I would have ordered Duggan out with his hands held high using my loudhailer.
None of my officers would have been anywhere near him until he got down on the floor as instructed.
I'm assuming that someone was in charge.
Problem 1. As soon as the police performed the hard stop Duggan was doing a runner.
Problem 2. If Duggan hadn't done a runner, you've virtually forced him to take the taxi driver as a hostage.
Problem 3. In the films cops do hide behind car doors, settee's, wooden tables, behind force fields. In real life none of these are effective ways to stop bullets.
Problem 4. They were in a busy London street at 6pm. There's a significant risk of innocent people becoming involved in the standoff and no way for the police to control the area because you've got them all hiding behind cars.
ATM you're criticising the police for their "screw up" which left an armed gangster dead. But your solution is one which is likely to end up with dead gangster, dead taxi driver and possibly a dead cop and/or bystander.
The problems with your solution would be pointed out by every armed response officer and most people who spend a short time thinking about it.
Now, if he comes out and legs it, I am a bit stuck apart from chasing him in the grand old British fashion.
I would have to know what the guidelines are. If it is OK to shoot him I would order that, if it isn't I wouldn't.
So if the guidelines say it is OK to shoot someone suspected of being armed if they are attempting to run away, then the police did nothing wrong.
But that wasn't the reason why they said they shot him, one of the officers felt threatened as Duggan was running away.
Duggan must have been a bit confused then if he was running towards the police.
This could go on for days ......
The police were performing a hard stop. Three cars stopped the taxi and at the same time as that's happening the armed cops are jumping out of the cop cars and surrounding the vehicle. While that's happening Duggan is attempting to do a runner. Duggan died about 6-10ft from the car door. IMO if the police are attempting a hard stop on a suspected armed criminal and that suspect is getting out of his car at a similar speed as the police there's simply no way to know if he's trying to do a runner or trying to take out cops with him. So the cop was totally justified in shooting him.
I do have support for the police, but in cases like this when they refuse to give evidence except on their own terms, that trust (for the people concerned, not the rest of the police) is suspended.
I've read about de Menezes death. I've read about Hillsborough. The death of de Menezes was about 1,000 times more of a screw up than this. Hillsborough was about 1 million times as bad.
Anyone who, without even bothering to look up details of the situation, invokes the names of de Menezes and Hillsborough over Duggan has no place whatsoever calling themselves a stanch supporter of the police.
Personally, I think the post incident response from police after incidents like this absolutely and totally sucks. But IMO the reason that they have to be like this is because if they aren't lawyers like Mike Mansfield would be happy to see cops jailed for simply doing their job and every time a gangster ended up dead it would be a Euromillions rollover jackpot win for their families. That would result in every armed police officer stepping down and possible chaos for the country.
The death of Jean Charles de Menezes was an absolute tragedy. The death of Mark Duggan is a tragedy for his family, but for the rest of Britain it's one less gangster thug on the streets.
