Manchester police Chief Constable Stephen Watson said on Friday that one of the [two] deceased victims “would appear to have suffered a wound consistent with a gunshot injury,” according to a preliminary report from the Home Office pathologist.
He said that since the police believed that the suspect, Jihad Al Shamie, did not have a gun, it must have been the police gunfire that hit the victims.
I think where we’re different is that your oversight seems to actually punish police. Even when ours is supposed to be independent, the politicians that appoint the overseers are chosen because the police won’t complain. It may be the unionization that enables that level of power or the general copaganda/crime panics prevalent in our society, but the review agencies are frequently toothless.
On this case, the criticism is not that they should have seen a person in their line of sight, it’s that they fired in a direction where they didn’t know with reasonable certainty who was in the line of fire. Shooting in the direction of the building with rounds that can penetrate the walls/doors introduces a risk of just this outcome.