Killed by the war on terror?

Air marshals aboard an American Airlines flight shot dead a man claiming to be carrying a bomb - the latest deadly consequence of the hysteria about terrorism.

Rigoberto Alpizar, a 44-year-old American, had an argument with his wife at the rear of the plane which was still on the tarmac at Miami airport. He then grabbed a piece of hand luggage and shoved his way off the plane, claiming he had a bomb inside his bag. When challenged by air marshals he refused to surrender. James Bauer, a spokesman for the Federal Air Marshal Service, stated in clumsy but rather chilling terms that air marshals 'fired shots with the result that he is deceased'. There is no suggestion that the marshals did anything other than follow the guidelines laid down by their superiors. But the man's wife had been shouting that he was mentally ill and that he had not taken his medication. Also, his behaviour was described by another passenger as 'frantic, his arms flailing in the air'.

Perhaps in the past, security staff would have used their judgement to assess that the man was not a threat. But tension about terrorism has been cranked up over the past few years, with a palpable sense of panic emanating from the highest levels of authority. There are parallels with the London shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes on 22 July. The message is 'when in doubt, shoot to kill' but this is more a 'shaking hand' than an 'iron fist'. Under such pressure, law enforcement officers are 'doing it by the book' - which can mean killing people even if it is not clear that they are a genuine threat. Ratcheting up fear about terrorism does nothing to prevent terrorist attacks, but the list of unwitting victims of the war on terror continues to grow.

Mentally unstable man shot dead by air marshals, Guardian, 8 December 2005