Jean Charles de Menezes
The gang of men who accosted and chased a terrified young electrician into the tube where they shot five bullets into his head after he tripped and fell onto the floor of a car filled with people were plainclothes policemen.
Jean Charles de Menezes entered Britain with student visa; he may or may not have still been a legal resident three days ago, but on the other hand, especially by post-9/11 standards, it's clear he was not perfectly white.
I don't want to hear or read anything more about how the victim was responsible* for his own death - and that we should all expect the same treatment ourselves to save us from terrorists.
For more, see the post of a friend/acquaintance:
His English was OK, but he wasnt fluent. He was pursued by up to 20 normally dressed men who screamed at him in a language that was not his own. Jean comes from Brasil, a country where violent crime is a lot more in your face than it is over here. A group of plainclothes men screaming at you, chasing you, you fucking run. Brasilian police frequently shoot the public indiscriminantly, there was an incident earlier this week - 10 killed. Maybe Jean had thoughts about this when he ran, I dont know. Watch "Bus 174".
*
including the only two letters read on the BBC News Hour this morning
[image from finn]
Reminds me of the Louisiana woman's statement to police, after she fatally shot a Japanese teen exchange student who had mistakenly come to her door early on Halloween evening, looking for his friends.
"I didn't know who he was. All I knew was, he was darker than me."
As if it could get any worse, a story in The Independent today says that de Menezes was shot 8 times. What the hell?
Do you have press about that "plain clothes" bit you can link to?
Reuters writes like the war is touching on the homefront.
Oh, don't you know it's impolite to talk about Japanese death.
the American press may not be bothered to report the facts of his killing, but anywhere you see a detailed account you will see the police who ended up accosting and shooting him clearly described as "plainclothes"
The Guardian has a very useful story in the form of a timeline.