London Terrorist Attacks

Would you have rather they tried to shoot every limb in his body - and compromised the safety of those on the underground carriage? The only failsafe way of immobilising somebody is to shoot them in the head.
Where else could they have shot him, if we work on the proviso that the suspect was [thought to be] wearing high explosive about his person?

There has been at least one incident that I can recall in Israel, of a Palestinian suicide bomber being ambushed - only to detonate his deadly payload in the ensuing struggle. If today's incident had occurred in a Jerusalem cafe, I have no doubt that Mossad and Israeli police would have done the same thing - and they're the authority on proactive means of putting terrorists out of circulation.

He was being watched after the attempted bombings on thursday and when asked to stop he ran form police in a tube station and tried to get onto a tube train? if he truly was innocent why would he run on to a tube train full of people who would no doubt love to beat the crap out of someone liek that and would hardly let him get off at the next stop would he?

I'm no marksman but personally I would find it easier to shoot someone in the leg than head. In any case, were 5 shots needed?

Also, again I'm no scientist but aren't there some kind of non-leathal instant tranquiliser bullets than can be used?

I really hope there was concrete info behind that man being a considered a terrorist.

I'm no marksman but personally I would find it easier to shoot someone in the leg than head. In any case, were 5 shots needed?

What's the use of shooting a suicide bomber in the leg? You want them instantly disabled so they're unable to detonate while experiencing the effects of the shot.

According to who? The police certainly haven't gone on record as saying that. If he was under surveilance, the police wouldn't announce it through the media - this is a criminal investigation, not a media fest...

Not everything reported in the media is true...

He was warned (as protocol dictates) and he chose to ignore those warnings. Chances are that he had a device on his person (according to eyewitnesses and will probably be confirmed sooner or later). If this is indeed the case, the police should be fully supported in their actions.

According to media reports, many 'eye witnesses', including the person next to him on the tube in question, said that there was no 'belt' or wires, and he didn't have a bag. Just wearing a thick coat.

I guess this proves the point that speculation is bad. Did he, didn't he? We probably will not know for a long time. Hell, the media were saying that he was catagorically 100% the Oval Station bomber earlier on today. Now suddenly, he's not...

Which begs the question, why chase him onto a train before shooting him?

Erm... there would have been the minor setback of the PUBLIC being all around Stockwell station. The police would be criticised harshly if they shot from long distance and ended up shooting innocent bystanders. They obviously waited until they caught up with him so they could do it close range.

"Police have said a man shot dead by police at Stockwell Tube station in south London is "directly linked" to anti-terrorist operations."

"BBC crime correspondent Neil Bennett says the man was under surveillance as a result of evidence gathered from the scenes of the four attempted bombings."

"BBC Home affairs correspondent Margaret Gilmore said officers had challenged a known suspect they had been following."


I think we can safely say the man was under surveillance.

He was running away from them a busy area would be my first thought.

But Sir Ian Blair and other key police spokes people refuse to answer that question - I've just been down in our lobby talking to our designated police officer, who also says the same.

BBC spokespeople said a whole lot of stuff on the 7th that turned out to be complete bull! So much for the BBCs recent decision to wait before breaking news to make sure reports were accurate

What kinda of suicide bomber terrorist runs away from highly crowded areas

I know, but this isn't one of those minor details which the BBC blag in the chance of it being right. Even common sense could come to the conclusion that this guy was under some sort of surveillance to be followed by 2 plain clothed armed police officers. Yes, it may not be confirmed by Ian Blair, but when the BBC claim in a main article "Police have said..." there's hopefully gonna be some truth in it, whether unofficial or whatever. I don't think they like libel cases after all!