Tube death probe delay explained (Ian Blair letter)

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

In a letter to the Home Office, Sir Ian Blair says he refused the Independent Police Complaints Commission access to the crime scene, at Stockwell Tube, where Jean Charles de Menezes died.

He says the Met's counter-terrorism investigation had to take priority.

(...)

"This investigation will be rigorous but subordinate to the needs of the counter-terrorism operation.

"In a fast-moving, multi-site terrorist situation, in which suicide bombers are clearly a very strong possibility, a chief officer of police should be able to suspend... Police Reform Act 2002 which requires us to supply all information that the Independent Police Complaints Commission may require," he adds.

The IPCC's "duty to provide as much information as it can to the complainant or to members of the deceased's family... could put further lives at risk in these circumstances", Sir Ian says.
"There is much concern about revealing either the tactics that we have and/or the sources of information on which we are operating."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4297532.stm


read the letter in full
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/30_09_05_blair_letter.pdf

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. That's absurd - he is trying to cover up evidence

How could allowing the IPCC access to the crime scene "put further lives at risk"? His first claim, that revealing the police tactics or how they get their information is a problem, is highly contestable (if we, as the members of the public, don't know that a shoot-to-kill policy is in force, then we are at risk ourselves), but there is no way he can extend that to barring the IPCC from examining the crime scene.

In practice, what this means is that the Met got a chance to destroy the station videos.

[Mr Creosote]

2. IT'S A FAKE COMRADES

The letter is dated 21st July, and refers to the shooting at Stockwell station "that has just occured". Mr De Menezes was shot on the 22nd. No-one was shot on the 21st.

[Briar]

3. That was a mistake at the time of writing

The letter was written hours after Mr de Menezes's was wrongly identified as a suicide bomb suspect and shot at Stockwell Tube station, south London on July 22. The letter was wrongly headed with July 21, the date of the failed London suicide bombings.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,1271,-5313379,00.html

Meanwhile, the BBC has invited Sir Ian to give the Dimbleby lecture.

[Mr Creosote]

4. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

don't know about you, but when I "write" a letter my computer knows the correct date. Looks very suss to me.

[Briar]

6. Nobody is denying the authenticity of the letter

not the Home office, which released it, nor any of the people it was copied to, nor Sir Ian Blair.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

5. Dimbleby lecture??!!!!

They can seriously fuck off with that one.