BRITAIN:The British police officers who shot Jean Charles de Menezes were convinced he was a suicide bomber who could only be stopped by an "instant killing", an inquest heard yesterday.
Coroner Sir Michael Wright said the innocent Brazilian was shot at Stockwell tube station even though no surveillance officer positively identified him as a terrorist.
The coroner outlined how senior officers overseeing the operation at Scotland Yard thought he was on-the-run failed suicide bomber Hussain Osman.
The crucial 33 minutes as Mr de Menezes (27) travelled to work on July 22nd, 2005, were recounted on the first day of the inquest into his death. The coroner recreated detectives' desperate efforts to track down the men responsible for attempting to create carnage on the London transport network.
Jurors heard how two specialist marksmen rushed on board a tube train and shot Mr de Menezes in the head as he was pinned to his seat by an undercover officer known as Ivor.
The two firearms officers - identified as Charlie Two and Charlie 12 - will give evidence in public for the first time later in the inquest.
Mr Wright said: "Both officers state that they were convinced Mr de Menezes was a suicide bomber, that he was about to detonate a bomb and, unless he was prevented from so doing, everybody present in that carriage was going to die. Each officer says he was convinced that an instant killing was the only option open to him.
"Each reached over Ivor and fired several times at point-blank range into Mr de Menezes's head."
Mr Wright told the jury: "It will be for you to consider what level of identification was made at different stages, what was communicated to the firearms officers, and what those officers believed the position to be."
The coroner said the electrician was killed instantly. "He can hardly have had any opportunity to appreciate what was happening."
A postmortem examination revealed Mr de Menezes had been shot seven times in the head.
The first evidence to be heard during the 12-week inquest at the Oval cricket ground in London outlined apparent misunderstandings between surveillance and firearms officers. "It does appear that, by the time Mr de Menezes had actually entered the underground system at Stockwell station, no member of the surveillance team had positively identified him as Osman," Sir Michael said.
"But at New Scotland Yard there does appear to have been a perception that Mr de Menezes had been positively identified as Osman."
The marksmen sent to the scene also believed Mr de Menezes was their suspect.
The inquest continues. - (PA)