Did police shoot this man four times then Taser him?
POLICE marksmen were accused last night of Tasering a man as he lay grievously wounded in the street after they had shot him four times with live bullets.
Witnesses claim they heard one of the 50,000 volt stun guns being discharged after George Asare, 25, collapsed in a pool of blood.
One claimed officers repeatedly kicked the suspected knifeman on the ground as they surrounded him in a chaotic confrontation.
Medical evidence has emerged that one of at least four Taser shots hit him in the groin, something his family believe was deliberate. Last night they demanded answers.
His mother, Elizabeth Benin, said: ‘Why wasn’t there a standoff? I want to know why the police did not try to talk to George.
‘George is not a bad person, he is a good person but he was not well, I don’t understand why they had to shoot him. I just thank God that he was not killed.’
Asare is due to appear before magistrates in Bromley, Kent, today accused of attempting to cause grievous bodily harm to police and affray.
He is being held in a secure psychiatric ward at the Bethlem Royal Hospital in Bromley, where he is recovering from his injuries.
The new claims dramatically contradict the original chain of events that emerged in the days after the shooting in Forest Hill, South-east London.
It was originally believed that police shot Asare with live rounds only after several Tasers were discharged but failed to restrain him as he threatened them.
Allegations he was Tasered after suffering potentially life - threatening injuries raises fresh disturbing questions about the use of the controversial devices.
This week, it emerged that Bernard Hogan- Howe, the country’s most senior policeman, has privately pledged to put more Tasers in his officers’ hands.
Critics fear expansion of their availability could reduce control of their use.
Asare, a British-born Ghanaian university graduate, was left fighting for his life with wounds to the abdomen, leg, groin and hand in the early hours of February 19.
‘They started to
kick him’
Local officers attended the suburban street where he lives with his mother after a member of the public dialled 999 to report someone suspected of trying to break into a car.
But they were forced to retreat and call in armed colleagues when Asare allegedly threatened officers with a ‘large bladed weapon’. It was later claimed that ‘several’ knives were found nearby.
Five live rounds were fired by police marksmen and photographs from the scene showed at least four discharged Taser cartridges. They also showed two of the bright yellow plastic weapons amid a tangle of thin metal wires that deliver the supposedly incapacitating electrical charge.
A family friend said: ‘George has suffered horrific injuries. The family believe it is the other way around, he was shot and then he was Tasered. Witnesses claim that when police came shots were fired almost immediately.
‘As soon as George hit the ground they surrounded him and started to kick him and then they heard the distinctive pop-poppop noise of a Taser.’
It was the first police shooting since the death of suspected gangster Mark Duggan last August, which sparked the riots.
A spokesman for the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which is investigating the shooting, confirmed that it is looking at the exact sequence of events and appealed for anyone with information to get in touch.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said she could not comment while the IPCC inquiry and criminal prosecution is under way.