The family and friends of Jean Charles de Menezes yesterday condemned Met Police Deputy Assistant Commissioner Cressida Dick for her insistance that police ‘did nothing wrong’ in putting seven bullets into the head of the young Brazilian at point blank range.
De Menezes was killed the day after the 21 July 2005 failed bombings.
Cressida Dick, then Commander Dick, was the DSO (Designated Senior Officer) in overall command of the shoot-to-kill operation on July 22.
Giving evidence at de Menezes’ inquest yesterday, she repeated the police line at the time of the shooting, that he was ‘unfortunately’ mistaken for suspect Hussein Osman.
Dick was asked by Nicholas Hilliard, QC for the coroner: ‘What went wrong?’
She replied: ‘One thing that clearly went wrong was that we didn’t manage as a nation to prevent those attacks.
‘Mr de Menezes was a victim of terrible and extraordinary circumstances that day and afterwards.
‘He was extremely unfortunate to live in the same block as Hussain Osman, desperately unfortunate to look very like Hussain Osman, and the things he did in all innocence, the way he behaved getting on and off the bus, contributed to our assessment, my assessment, of him as a bomber.
‘But if you are asking me did we do anything wrong or unreasonable, then I don’t think we did.’
Her evidence was given in front of Jean Charles de Menezes’ mother Maria Otone de Menezes, 63, and his brother Giovani de Menezes, 36 who had arrived in London from Brazil to be at the inquest.
A spokesman for the Justice4Jean campaign said: ‘It has been highly alarming and extremely insulting for the bereaved Menezes family to hear evidence at the inquest from senior officers in the Metropolitan Police that they did nothing wrong and that a similar tragedy could happen again.
‘This continued rebuttal of any wrongdoing on their part only adds to the shameful perception that the Metropolitan Police has no regrets and shows no remorse.’
As well as hearing from Dick, over the coming weeks Maria Otone de Menezes will hear evidence from the two officers who shot her son, known only as C1 and C2.
Last week Detective Chief Superintendent Jon Boutcher told the inquest jury: ‘I cannot see anything we could have done that would have changed the course of the tragedy of Mr de Menezes.’
He also admitted he could not rule out someone being killed in a similar situation again.
