A suspected bomber has been
shot five times by "plain-clothes police officers" on a London underground train. The suspect was shot
after police "pushed him to the floor, bundled on top of him." Basically, the guy was executed before he could possibly trigger his device. Eye-witnesses said the man "appears to have a bomb belt and wires coming out."
It is believed he was chased by police because they identified him from CCTV photos as one of four wanted terrorist suspects implicated in Thursday's incidents, though Sky news has said that security sources say that he was not one of the four.
This of course raises the question of whether the police took the right course of action - of course they did, but this is not shared by an American talkback radio caller. The following is a paraphrase from a listener:
Caller: I heard the guy was on the ground and they shot him five times. I think that is excessive. Why do you shoot someone five times when they are subdued on the ground? The cops are bad people...
Host: The cops thought he was a suicide bomber, if they have to shoot him 100 times to make sure he doesn't kill commuters then they should shoot him 100 times.
Caller: I still think that it's excessive...
The police had to be absolutely certain he was not going to trigger his bomb and kill not only them, but passengers on board the train. The most effective way to do this is to make the sure the suspect is dead, and in a situation like that you cannot take chances. They saw he was carrying a bomb, they stopped him from carrying out his act of terrorism, end of story.
Michael Winner, chairman of the Police Memorial Trust, agrees with me. Unfortunately he also spouted some pretty strong rhetoric about anti-terrorism laws:
"Our whole approach to terrorism is absurd. We need new laws to detain people without trial - we are at war. We are playing cricket and they're playing mass murder. Police powers should be massively increased, as well as police numbers. The so-called politically correct liberals have on their hands the blood of many of our citizens already."
The classic right-wing tactic of blaming the "liberals" for everything rears its ugly and illogical head again (however the liberals are no better, as Norm Geras notes), along with the "we are at war" line that supposably allows anything with impunity, despite the absence of any actual war. Yes, police powers need to be beefed up, but not to the extent he is probably advocating, and definitely not coupled with a political cheap shot.
Understandably the Muslim community is a little jumpy about the apparent "shoot to kill policy" of this kind of action. As they say, the reasons for the shooting need to be made public, but I am certain they will show that the unloading of five bullets was justified.