Tony Hatfield's Retired Ramblings

The Much-Quoted "bomber"

Have a look at this piece of journalism from Sky News. It’s from their website.

It is of course an account of the incident that took place at Stockwell Tube Station on 22^nd July.

The headline is enclosed by quotation marks. The reader is invited to accept the phrase the “Bomber looked terrified” as a direct quote from some one. Who described the terrified person as a bomber? Indeed the first sentence magically converts the "bomber" into a "suicide bomber". But I'll let that pass.

Mark Whitby describes the incident. But the expression “Mr Whitby said the suspected bomber….” is not surrounded by quotation marks. In other words, this is not a direct quote.

Teri Godly was in the carriage when the suspected bomber boarded. Again, no quotation marks round “suspected bomber”.

So no help there.

But perhaps the author has used the Metropolitan Police as the source.

Below the Sky piece, are the only two Met press releases of the 22^nd July.

From the first, an extract from the Met’s Press conference, no mention of bomber. The incident was “linked to the ongoing and expanding anti-terrorist operation”. The second, and perhaps, more considered drops the suggestion of any link.

Here are the pieces.S k Sky Website “BOMBER LOOKED PETRIFIED”

Eyewitnesses have told of their face-to-face encounter with the suspected suicide bomber. Mark Whitby said he was sitting on the Tube at Stockwell when the man ran in to the carriage. He described suddenly hearing people shouting "get down, get down". Mr Whitby said: "An Asian guy ran on to the train. As he ran, he was hotly pursued by what I knew to be three plain-clothes police officers. As the man got on the train I looked at his face. He looked from left to right, but he basically looked like a cornered rabbit, like a cornered fox. "He looked absolutely petrified. "He half-tripped, was half-pushed to the floor. "One of the police officers was holding a black automatic pistol in his left hand. They held it down to him and unloaded five shots into him. I saw it. He's dead, five shots, he's dead." "I'm totally distraught," he added. "It was no more than five yards away from where I was sitting as I saw it with my own eyes." Mr Whitby said the suspected bomber "looked like a Pakistani" and was wearing a baseball cap and a thick coat. He added: "He was quite large, big built, quite a sort of chubby guy." Teri Godly, who was also in the carriage when the suspected bomber boarded, said: "A tall Asian man with a beard and a rucksack got on after me. "Then about eight or nine police with shotguns boarded after him and started shouting to us all 'get out, get out of the station'. "People started screaming and we all started running quite calmly up the stairs. There were six or seven gun shots behind us. It was very surreal. No one was pushing or shoving. We were in a state of shock. "It was only afterwards that I realised how lucky we had been." Chris Wells, a 28-year-old company manager, said he was travelling on the Victoria Line towards Vauxhall when he left the train at Stockwell. He saw about 20 police officers, some of them armed, rushing into the station before a man jumped over the barriers with police giving chase. He said: "There were at least 20 officers and they were carrying big black guns.” The next thing I saw was this guy jump over the barriers and the police officers were chasing after him and everyone was just shouting 'get out, get out'."

I can say as part of operations linked to yesterday's incidents, Met police officers have shot a man inside Stockwell Underground Station at approximately 10am this morning. London Ambulance Service and the air ambulance both attended and the man was pronounced dead at the scene. I understand Stockwell tube station remains closed. The information I have available if that this shooting is directly linked to the ongoing and expanding anti-terrorist operation. Any death is deeply regrettable. I understand the man was challenged and refused to obey. I can't go any further than that at this stage…

Met Press Release 22/7

Man Shot at Stockwell Tube station.

We can confirm that at just after 10am this morning, Friday 22 July, armed officers from the Metropolitan Police entered Stockwell tube station in south London. A man was challenged by officers and was subsequently shot. London Ambulance Service and the Helicopter Emergency Service attended the scene. The man was pronounced dead at the scene. Stockwell tube station is closed and cordons of 200 metres are in place. As is routine, officers from the Met's Directorate of Professional Standards have been informed.

It's interesting to compare the accuracy of the BBC website report. No mention of bombers, no mention of suicide bombers. Cheers t

posted by Tony @ Sunday, July 24, 2005