Barrister's home surrounded by 59 armed police during siege, coroner told

A total of 59 firearms officers armed with more than 100 weapons surrounded the home of the barrister Mark Saunders before he was shot dead in a volley of police bullets, an inquest heard. The strength of firepower used to contain the 32-year-old divorce lawyer at his Chelsea home during a five-hour siege was revealed as a senior police officer said he had sought to "minimise" police action. Inspector Nick Bennett, the tactical firearms adviser during the police operation, told jurors: "My concerns were to minimise any form of overt action by police which could initiate any reaction or over-reaction from Mr Saunders." Nicholas Hilliard QC, counsel for the inquest, asked: "If in this particular situation you could avoid the area bristling with firearms officers, is that something you would try to do if it could safely be done?" He replied: "I certainly wouldn't have any more firearms officers there than I thought necessary." Saunders, a former Territorial Army soldier, who was very drunk, died at 21.32pm on 6 May 2008 after seven firearms officers shot at him believing he was aiming his shotgun at them. Just minutes before he died, powerful lights, enough to "light up half a football pitch", had been shone on Saunders's Markham Square property. Bennett admitted he had overridden an earlier command by his superior officer that lights should not be used to illuminate Saunders for fear it would put officers at increased risk. But Bennett told Westminster coroner's court after Saunders had shot out his window at 21.09pm, prompting police to fire back, firearms officers had complained they could not see properly into his premises. He felt officers were at increased risk without the lights. Patrick Gibbs QC, for Saunders's widow Elizabeth, asked: "Was this to provoke a reaction from Mr Saunders?" Gibbs referred to a taped conversation between police negotiators at the time in which they could be heard saying that Saunders was "gonna get a load of lights on the back in a moment". The negotiators went on to say that it would "hopefully provoke a reaction", adding: "Cos he's gonna get Blackpool illuminations through his front window in a minute." Bennett replied: "Absolutely not." He hoped the lights might help "reinstigate negotiations" with Saunders, who was no longer in communication with the negotiators. "Just try to picture it from Mr Saunders's point of view," said Gibbs. "The helicopter has come down low. He would have been almost deafened, do you agree?" Bennett said he disagreed. Gibbs continued: "And then the lights go in and are turned on and all the officers with their guns are all still up there pointing at him . Do you think this was likely to calm the situation down?" Bennett replied that it was "a tactical operation". Police could not discount the possibility Saunders could have been injured in the exchange of fire earlier. Marksman had already been shining "Sure Fire" torches at the premises and he did not think the lights contributed to a "massive change in environment". "Would they have been enough to light up half a football pitch, as we have previously heard?" said Gibbs. "You said you wanted to try to minimise overt action so as to avoid reaction and over-reaction from Mr Saunders. Is it your evidence that what happened after 9.09 [when Saunders blew his window out] was from the containment officers' point of view a minimising of overt action? Or do you think rather it increased the overt action?" Bennett replied: "It continued a vein. I don't think it minimised or increased it." He added: "This was the least intrusive use as far as firearms were concerned which could have been adopted." He told jurors he did not believe police could have used a "less lethal option" of a baton gun firing rubber bullets. Baton guns were "an exceptionally high-risk strategy" and could have provoked confrontation or injured, if not killed, Saunders, requiring officers to access the house to render first aid. It was also difficult to shoot them accurately through the narrow gap in the window. Asked why he had not considered the option of allowing Saunders's wife to knock at the door and try to speak to her husband, he said he was responsible for her safety. "We may have been delivering a hostage – I know it sounds painful to say that – but delivering a potential hostage into a situation where we didn't already have one," he said.