Ex-police marksman who was cleared of murder calls for ‘better understanding’ of officers who use lethal force
Tony Long is a member of a small, exclusive club he’d rather not belong to.
He’s one of four police marksmen who have stood trial for murder after shooting dead a suspect.
The most recent was Martyn Blake who was cleared today of murdering Chris Kaba in south London in September 2022.
I asked Mr Long a question he has been asked many times: how does a firearms officer feel after killing someone?
“Me personally, a sort of emptiness,” he replied. “Feeling a sort of guilt, but not feeling guilty, if that makes sense.
“You know, for me and for all of us, really, I suppose, taking human life isn’t something you take casually, not unless you’re a psychopath. And I also felt anger.”
The former police marksman, now 67 and long-retired, has vivid memories of shooting dead Azelle Rodney, a suspected gang member who officers thought was on his way to commit an armed robbery in north London in 2005.
Azelle Rodney was shot dead in April 2005
Police stopped the car he was in and Mr Long shot him six times because he feared 24-year-old Rodney’s movements meant he was reaching for a gun.
“I had to sit at the scene for ages and I watched my colleagues trying to do first aid on the young man that I’d shot,” Mr Long said.
“And then eventually an ambulance arrived and said; ‘He’s gone’, which we knew, but we have to try. And they covered him up with a blanket.
“Of course, it’s a crime scene now, so I had to just sit there and look at this red blanket, and the more I looked, the more angry I got.”
Tony Long leaves the Old Bailey during his trial in 2015. Pic: PA
Mr Long had to wait 10 years to stand trial, subject first to a long investigation and a public inquiry which had concluded he wasn’t legally justified in opening fire.
In court, he was acquitted by the jury.
Since 1990, police in England and Wales have shot and killed 83 people.
Before Mr Long’s trial, an officer was tried and acquitted of murdering David Ewin in southwest London in 1995, a verdict delivered after two previous juries had failed to make a decision.
Another officer was tried and acquitted of murdering James Ashley in East Sussex in 1998. Four other Sussex officers were cleared on lesser charges.
In 2021, PC Benjamin Monk was jailed for eight years for manslaughter over the death of former Aston Villa footballer Dalian Atkinson, who was tasered multiple times and kicked in the head. The officer was cleared of murder.
A police officer was jailed for the manslaughter of Dalian Atkinson (pictured). Pic: PA
Mr Atkinson was involved in a stand-off with police after suffering a mental breakdown.
In a long career with the Metropolitan Police, Mr Long had been commended seven times. He had previously shot dead two other suspects but had faced no criminal or disciplinary action.
“It’s impossible to be a police officer for too long nowadays without having to get in a violent confrontation with people,” he said.
“We actually know the reality of real life conflict. But the people that are judging you they don’t understand that. And they go, well, you said this and now you’re saying this or your colleague doesn’t say that.”
Mr Long followed the trial of Blake over the death of Mr Kaba who was stopped while driving a car thought to have been linked with a shooting incident the night before.
The prosecution had accused Blake, in statements to police, of giving false or exaggerated accounts of what happened and his responses.
Chris Kaba was shot dead by a police officer in September 2022. Pic: Family handout/PA
Mr Long said: “You and I could be literally feet apart. We could be shoulder to shoulder, and I would see a need to shoot somebody. But you wouldn’t have seen it just because of, you know, a foot difference in angle and your recollection won’t be the same because when you’re in a high threat situation, there’s all sorts of chemicals released into the body that mess with your normal daily cognitive way of dealing with things and understanding things.
“If you’ve not been in that position and you’re judging purely on what you’ve seen on a body-worn camera in the comfort of (a) little studio and rewinding it, then playing it forward and then freeze framing it, you may think you understand what went on, and in real terms you might have a better understanding of what actually happened and the people that were there.”
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley has called for more legal protection for officers who use lethal force, but it’s not clear to Mr Long how that would work.
He said: “We ask those police officers to look after us. And if we train them to use these varying degrees of force, ending up potentially with lethal force, then I think we should be, not cutting them some slack, but we should have a better understanding. And you can’t just automatically say, well, that police officer shot someone and then go, well, charged with murder.”
Specialist search teams, police dogs and divers have been dispatched to find two sisters who vanished in Aberdeen three days ago.
Eliza and Henrietta Huszti, both 32, were last seen on CCTV in the city’s Market Street at Victoria Bridge at about 2.12am on Tuesday.
The siblings were captured crossing the bridge and turning right onto a footpath next to the River Dee in the direction of Aberdeen Boat Club.
Henrietta Huszti. Pic: Police Scotland
Eliza Huszti. Pic: Police Scotland
Police Scotland has launched a major search and said it is carrying out “extensive inquires” in an effort to find the women.
Chief Inspector Darren Bruce said: “Local officers, led by specialist search advisors, are being assisted by resources including police dogs and our marine unit.”
Aberdeenshire Drone Services told Sky News it has offered to help in the search and is waiting to hear back from Police Scotland.
CCTV of the sisters. Pic: Police Scotland
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The sisters, from Aberdeen city centre, are described as slim with long brown hair.
Police said the Torry side of Victoria Bridge where the sisters were last seen contains many commercial and industrial units, with searches taking place in the vicinity.
The force urged businesses in and around the South Esplanade and Menzies Road area to review CCTV footage recorded in the early hours of Tuesday in case it captured anything of significance.
Drivers with relevant dashcam footage are also urged to come forward.
CI Bruce added: “We are continuing to speak to people who know Eliza and Henrietta and we urge anyone who has seen them or who has any information regarding their whereabouts to please contact 101.”
Glasgow has been a city crying out for solutions to a devastating drugs epidemic that is ravaging people hooked on deadly narcotics.
We have spent time with vulnerable addicts in recent months and witnessed first-hand the dirty, dangerous street corners and back alleys where they would inject their £10 heroin hit, not knowing – or, in many cases, not caring – whether that would be the moment they die.
“Dying would be better than this life,” one man told me.
It was a grim insight into the daily reality of life in the capital of Europe’s drug death crisis.
Scotland has a stubborn addiction to substances spanning generations. Politicians of all persuasions have failed to properly get a grip of the emergency.
But there is a new concept in town.
From Monday, a taxpayer-funded unit is allowing addicts to bring their own heroin and cocaine and inject it while NHS medical teams supervise.
A dirty needle thrown less than 100 metres from the new injection centre
It may be a UK-first but it is a regular feature in some other major European cities that have claimed high success rates in saving lives.
Glasgow has looked on with envy at these other models.
One supermarket car park less than a hundred metres from this new facility is a perfect illustration of the problem. An area littered with dirty needles and paraphernalia. A minefield where one wrong step risks contracting a nasty disease.
Drugs paraphernalia in a supermarket car park in Glasgow, near the new facility
It is estimated hundreds of users inject heroin in public places in Glasgow every week. HIV has been rife.
The new building, which will be open from 9am until 9pm 365 days a year, includes bays where clean needles are provided as part of a persuasive tactic to lure addicts indoors in a controlled environment.
There is a welcome area where people will check in before being invited into one of eight bays. The room is clinical, covered in mirrors, with a row of small medical bins.
Clean needles are provided to lure addicts to inject in a controlled environment
There are eight bays users can inject in
We were shown the aftercare area where users will relax after their hit in the company of housing and social workers.
The idea is controversial and not cheap – £2.3m has been ring-fenced every year.
The aftercare area
Read more: ‘Dying would be better than my £1,000 a month heroin addiction’
Authorities in the city first floated a ‘safer drug consumption room’ in 2016. It failed to get off the ground as the UK Home Office under the Conservatives said they would not allow people to break the law to feed habits.
The usual wrangle between Edinburgh and London continued for years with Downing Street suggesting Scotland could, if it wanted, use its discretion to allow these injecting rooms to go ahead.
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The stalemate ended when Scotland’s most senior prosecutor issued a landmark decision that it would not be in the public interest to arrest those using such a facility.
One expert has told me this new concept is unlikely to lead to an overall reduction in deaths across Scotland. Another described it as an expensive vanity project. Supporters clearly disagree.
The question is what does success look like?
The big test will be if there is a spike in crime around the building and how it will work alongside law enforcement given drug dealers know exactly where to find their clients now.
It is not disputed this is a radical approach – and other cities across Britain will be watching closely.
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