UK Guards Charged over Death of Angolan Deportee
British prosecutors said Thursday they would bring manslaughter charges against three guards from private security firm G4S over the death of an Angolan man while he was being deported.
An inquest last year found that Jimmy Mubenga, 46, was unlawfully killed after he was restrained with "unreasonable force" by the guards in October 2010 on a British Airways flight to Angola.
The plane was stopped on the runway at London's Heathrow Airport after he was found to have stopped breathing.
Mubenga, a father of five children, was taken to hospital but died of cardio-respiratory collapse.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) initially decided not to bring criminal charges against the guards, Terrence Hughes, 53, Stuart Tribelnig, 38, and Colin Kaler, 51.
But in a statement on Thursday, it said fresh evidence meant it would now be reversing this decision.
"We have completed a fresh review of all of the evidence relating to the death of Jimmy Mubenga, including the new evidence arising from the inquest, and decided that three men should be prosecuted for manslaughter," said Malcolm McHaffie, deputy head of the CPS special crime division.
"There is sufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction and it is in the public interest to prosecute Colin Kaler, Terrence Hughes and Stuart Tribelnig."
The CPS added that there was "insufficient evidence" to prosecute G4S for corporate manslaughter.
The three guards will appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court in London on April 7.
Source: Agence France Presse
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