Anger as police cleared of table-leg killing

dehavilland: The solicitor of a man shot dead when police mistook the table leg he had been carrying for a shotgun has today voiced his anger at the decision not to discipline the officers involved.

Harry Stanley was killed seven years ago in Hackney, east London, when Inspector Neil Sharman and PC Kevin Fagan opened fire on him after receiving intelligence that he had a sawn-off shotgun in a carrier bag.

The officers were originally found guilty of unlawful killing at an inquest, but that verdict was quashed by the high court.

And today an Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) report recommended no further action should be taken against the two men saying that while "some discrepancies remain unexplained", the evidence "supports the officers' version that Mr Stanley was facing towards them when he was shot".

But the report did recommend that police procedure for recording statements in such situations is changed to ensure that there cannot be allegations of officers falsifying their accounts. Read more