2. The police were not in uniform.

3. Violent crime, and armed violent crime, is extremely high in Brazil.

4. Violent crime, and armed violent crime, is also high in the Stockwell/Brixton area, as is gang mugging.

5. The ‘house’ may, or may not be, an old Victorian or Georgian terraced house split into flats, as in non-affluent areas of central London intact houses are rare (more money in two rented flats). Hence exiting the observed ‘house’ may simply mean ‘using a common entrance with the flat under surveillance’.

6. It is currently unclear how the police challenged the man, whether they made clear their affiliation or not. They were, as stated above, not in uniform and packing guns (which is not something emblematic of police in the UK, as most police are not armed).

7. The killed man was not a native english speaker

8. People do not act rationally when panicked, as for example when armed men confront you.

I’m in no mood for blaming the police. However, the ’smoke without fire’ insinuations made on this thread are baseless and entirely inappropriate following the death due to mistaken identity.

I’m afraid that your gratuitous slurs against Mr. Crawford come off as absurd non-sequiturs. Please, make your argument that London cops know what they are doing with their guns and LA cops do not, explain why you think this poses problems for our ability to prosecute the war on terror, perhaps respond to his contention that the two situations are not comparable, maybe fill us in on why this is such a hot-button issue for you – and save the ad hominem attacks for the trolls, rather than honest commenters with whom you disagree.

Many thanks for your consideration.

Mark Morgan

I am not waving my NRA or TSRA credentials, but I know how to shoot. All I know is that you don’t shoot your friends, which is more apparently than the LA police or you know.

This is a time of war. In a time of war, whether in a law enforcement or anti-terrorist situation, the only thing that matters is that the men with guns know what they’re doing. Which is to say, they know to shoot the enemy and not each other or innocent bystanders.

I would say that I’m shocked that you fail to understand this simple and fundamental point. But I’m not. As an American, I am however embarrassed.

Oh, and by the way, you cognitive development hasn’t evidenced much improvement. I suggest you try a heavy dose of reality.

If the whitest, palest, and most caucasion man in Britain would have run from police with a heavy jacket in summer, he would have been dispatched in the same way. He was not chased for his color, he was chased for his conduct.

The Left has never understood the distinction between conduct and race. I just heard the epitome of Leftist Stupidity, Keith Olberman, say that British police “assumed” the Brazilian was a terrorist. No, Keith; British police concluded he was a terrorist because of his conduct. They cared little about his skin color.

If you don’t think that whiteys can act like terrorists, just go read the hate spewed at Daily Kos, DU, Atrios, BBC, Guardian, and from Pilger and Galloway.

The War on Terror is not a color thing, no matter how much the Left tries to characterize it as such.

That may well be. The pics I saw were outside the station and the men were armed. There were four of them and one was plain clothes, the others looked like swat or something.

Does anyone know if the police shoot-to-kill policy was public knowledge? I doubt that this fellow knew. I doubt that the public at large was informed of this policy. Why did he run? Simple, he was in a state of panic and fear drove all reason from his mind. It happens and people end up dead.