Dong20, actually the facts of the case actually describe a slightly different story. Jean Charles de Menezes was not quite as innocent as the media would have us believe.
First, he entered this country under the pretext of studying, even though his real intention was to work in the black economy. Second, he forged a stamp on his passport so it appeared he’d been granted indefinite leave to stay, his visa to remain in the UK having expired in 2003. Third, he set himself up in business as an electrician and defrauded the British economy of thousands in unpaid income tax.
I didn't suggest he was innocent or a saint and his immigration status isn't germane to my post, or the actions of the police, who if you recall didn't shoot him for moonlighting. But just for clarification last time I checked immigration offences and a little tax evasion doesn't warrant seven bullets in the head under questionable circumstances.
My post wasn't about the merits (or not) of Menezes' character but the competencs, integrity and fitness for purpse of some elements of the Met, most especially it's head.
Jean Charles de Menezes was an illegal immigrant, a liar, a forger, a fraudster and a fugitive from justice.
These are serious crimes, but to listen to the BBC tell it, you could be forgiven for thinking Menezes was completely innocent man. Their coverage predictably contains no reference to an inconvenient fact about this case which our media always ignores; that Jean Charles de Menezes was a criminal.
Well, I tend to look a little beyond the mainstream media. I do think you're rather over dramatising his status as a criminal mastermind, it may be moot, and a technicality but he had not been convicted of those crimes, had he.
They blithely repeat all of the tropes concerning the very sad and unfortunate events of July 22 2005 - "The young Brazilian was innocent"; "It was a disastrous case of mistaken identity"; "The law applies to all citizens, including police officers. There are no special cases". This news has, to all intents and purposes, disappeared.
In the context of the crime of which he was killed (without due process, I might add), he
was innocent. What's your point?
This does not mean he deserved to be shot nor does it relieve the police of their responsibility. Their shoddy police work and "shoot-first" tactics should be roundly denounced and I do denounce them. However, the de Menezes family is seeking monetary compensation. Of course I have every sympathy for the de Menezes family, but are they entitled to the same compensation that the family of a British citizen would be? After all, the fact remains that he shouldn't have been here. If he had not been breaking the law, he would still be alive. Something to think about.
The
are entitled to compensation. Unless of course you are saying that compensation for being IMHO unlawfully killed is contingent on him being a straight up guy?
On this, I think you have made your views quite clear. That the right to justice or rather to compensation for a manifest injustice - depends on being innocent of even unrelated offences and, above all
not being johnny foreigner.
And is it not hypocritical for Brazilian officials to descend on London in a blaze of publcity demanding "Justice"?. The loud demand comes from a country where police shoot hundreds every year, use "throwdown" guns to indicate resistance to arrest, destroy evidence and rarely ever respond to demands for nvestigations. 1,100 were killed in 2003 alone.
Irrelevent. What happens in Brazil has no bearing on the actions of the police in the UK. Exactly how is that hypocitical. Do the Brazilan people revel in having a judicial system that is broken because that's the only way the word hypocritical would apply. If anything it should raise the expectation that the family should seek, and receive justice.
If he had been, for example an 'innocent' tourist from Sudan and was killed in this way are you implying that his family would be somehow
less entitled to justice merely because he was from a country that overreacts to the naming of a teddy bear?
So we have ONE admittedly tragic incident at a time of high tension as we're threatened by terrorists and they're vociferously up in arms! Would we dare to demand the resignation of THEIR Chief of police in Sao Paolo?
It's not the first screw up by the police in that conext, but again what's your point - that we should say nothing and do nothing until it's in double, or triple digits? As for your question about the Sao Paulo police chief....I would hope so.
A far more humane immigration policy would have been one where some official knew that JCDM had not left the country when he should have; where that official was making every effort to find him; and once found he had been jailed and then deported.
He might not have been in a position to send remittances back to Gonzaga, Brazil; but it would have been one that might have enabled to see his 28th birthday.
Well, immigration policy is a shambles for sure, but the consequences of such failings shouldn't be fatal.
Hopefully that thought keeps at least one or other of The Downing Street Gang awake at night.
I doubt it.
