A Metropolitan police marksman has told a court he shot dead an unarmed man in a car after becoming “filled with dread” the suspect would use the vehicle as a weapon and kill his colleagues trying to detain him.
Martyn Blake denies the murder of 24-year-old Chris Kaba on 5 September 2022 in Streatham, south London.
The Audi Q8 Kaba was driving had been forced to stop by police who believed it was linked to a firearms incident the previous night in nearby Brixton.
Blake, 40, told the jury at the Old Bailey he had never fired his gun at a suspect before in six years serving as an armed officer.
Officers had followed the Audi that Kaba was driving and having forced it to stop jumped out of their vehicles as they raced to “extract” the driver, shouting “armed police” and “show me your hands”.
Previous police witnesses, as well as Blake, said the Audi tried to escape, and the firearms officer said he heard the revving of engines and the screech of tyres.
The court heard how Blake rushed out of his marked police BMW, which was blocking the Audi at the front, and fired a single shot in 17 seconds.
Blake, questioned by his barrister, Patrick Gibbs KC, and with Kaba’s family just feet away, was asked: “Why did you pull the trigger?”
The officer replied: “I had a genuine belief that there was an imminent threat to life, I thought one or more of my colleagues was about to die.
“I thought I was the only person with effective firearms cover at the time.
“If I hadn’t acted I thought one of my colleagues would be dead. I felt I had a duty to protect them at the time.”
Blake shot Kaba through the car’s windscreen, with the bullet striking him in the head. He was pronounced dead little more than two hours later.
The firearms officer said he had followed his training and aimed at the central body mass aiming to “incapacitate” the driver, not kill him.
Blake told the jury he believed the vehicle must be stopped because of the danger it posed, with Kaba having rammed the police car blocking him at the front and reversed.
The defendant added he was unaware that seconds after the standoff started, a police car to the rear of Kaba’s Audi had moved in to tighten the block. The prosecution says that when Blake fired, Kaba’s car was stationary and boxed in at the front and rear.
The prosecution has told the jury that the Audi never reached a speed of more than 12 miles an hour once it was blocked in.
Blake had exited his car and then raised his weapon into the aim position, helped by a laser sight. He told the court he could see that his colleagues, trying to detain Kaba, were close to the car. Some, he added, were “in touching distance” trying to break the Audi’s windows: “After the shot, the revs ceased straight away.”
He said in the dark he had fired, aiming above the steering wheel believing that was the best chance of hitting the central body mass of the driver.
Blake said every firearms officer thought being in a position where they had to open fire “won’t happen to them”.
He said while he did not intend to kill, when he opened fire he was aware it was a possibility and that he did so “because of the threat to my colleagues”. Blake added that after firing he felt both “awful” and “numb” and the incident played through his mind repeatedly in the following weeks .
The prosecution had earlier claimed Blake exaggerated his account and that he fired having become angry and frustrated as Kaba defied police and tried to escape.
Asked by his barrister, Blake denied firing out of anger, frustration or annoyance.
The trial continues.
