The Associated Press
LONDON- Two Metropolitan Police officers who shot to death an unarmed Londoner walking home from a pub in 1999 should face no disciplinary action, a police watchdog recommended Thursday to the anger of the victim’s widow.
In a report to police commanders and the government, the Independent Police Complaints Commission ruled that Inspector Neil Sharman and Constable Kevin Fagan erred when they fatally shot Harry Stanley in the head and hand in Hackney, east London, in September 1999. Both officers testified they believed Stanley, 46, was carrying a sawn-off shotgun in a bag, but it turned out to be a table leg.
The commission recommended a series of reforms in how police investigate fatal shootings committed by their own officers, but said it would be wrong to punish the two officers for their mistake. Both officers last year were arrested on suspicion of murder, but in October state prosecutors announced that no criminal charges would be filed.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke, the government’s Cabinet minister responsible for law enforcement in England and Wales, welcomed the report’s findings.
“We have to get the procedures right, and we have to investigate properly through the IPCC, which is what we are doing, and we have to take the conclusions seriously, which we will,” Clarke said. “But let’s not vilify the officers who are doing an often very difficult job.”
Stanley’s widow, Irene, said she feared that police marksmen would view the commission’s verdict would mean “innocent people are at greater risk from armed police after today’s decision.”