‘They shot an unarmed man who was trying to protect his family at four o-clock in the morning.’
This is how friends of the 23-year-old victim responded to yesterday’s ‘intelligence-led’ police raid on a house in Lansdowne Road, Forest Gate, east London.
His friends continued: ‘There were three hundred police officers at the scene, for one man!
‘He’s a hard-working, law-abiding citizen, he’s paid taxes and today at four o’clock the police gave him a present.
‘They’ve given him a hole in the chest!’
Three roads in the area remained cordoned off in the continuing joint MI5, Metropolitan Police and Health Protection Agency operation yesterday afternoon. Witnesses had earlier seen a young man being carried out of the house wearing a blood-stained T-shirt.
A number of police carrying automatic rifles were later deployed outside the Royal London hospital where the wounded man was being treated.
Police said he had been arrested, but claimed his condition was not life-threatening.
A 20-year-old man was also arrested in the raid carried out under the Terrorism 2000 Act and is being held at Paddington Green high security police station.
In a brief statement at midday, Independent Police Complaints Commissioner Deborah Glass said: ‘The incident was referred to the IPCC immediately and our investigators were deployed to the scene.
‘An examination of the officers’ firearms confirms that a single shot was discharged in circumstances that are currently under investigation.’
A number of officers were armed and wore special protective suits. Police said the operation was not linked to the July 7 2005 London bombings.
Head of the Metropolitan Police anti-terror branch, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke said: ‘The purpose of the investigation, after ensuring public safety, is to prove or disprove the intelligence that we have received.’
Clarke said the investigation involving ‘a painstaking search of the premises in Lansdowne Road’ may take ‘several days to complete’.
Aircraft have been banned from flying over the site below 2,500ft.
