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'A senior police officer was called at the Lord's Test match and told you have shot the shot the wrong guy' London Telegraph / Ben Leapman | March 26 2006 Flashback: De Menezes Shooting: All the facts point to a cover up A senior Scotland Yard officer was allegedly telephoned at the Ashes Test match at Lord's to be told that police had just shot dead an innocent man in the aftermath of the failed 21/7 terrorist bombings, according to documents seen by the Sunday Telegraph. Deputy Assistant Commissioner John Yates was said to have been told on Friday, July 22 - within hours of the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes in London - that the Brazilian man had no connection with terrorism. If the account is true, it increases the pressure on Sir Ian Blair, the embattled Metropolitan Police Commissioner, who insists that he did not know until the following day - Saturday, July 23 - that the wrong man had been shot.At the centre of the row is the controversial officer Brian Paddick, also a deputy assistant commissioner at the Met. Internal force documents describe how Mr Paddick said to a broadcast journalist last month: "An officer of the same rank as me was rung off-duty at the cricket match and told, 'You have shot the wrong guy'." Now facing an investigation into alleged unauthorised disclosure of confidential information, Mr Paddick insists he was merely passing on a rumour, not stating fact. But the row over events following the de Menezes shooting, focusing on who knew what and when, threatens to tear Scotland Yard apart and undermine Sir Ian's leadership irreparably. He stands to lose his job if an inquiry by the Independent Police Complaints Commission finds that he knew the same day that the wrong man had been killed. Yesterday, Scotland Yard confirmed that a senior officer had attended day two of the England v Australia match on Friday, July 22 and named him as Mr Yates, of the Met's specialist crime directorate. He was on leave, despite the terrorist emergency. Mr Yates, 48, is regarded as a rising star of Scotland Yard. His previous role on the Met's SCD6 team - dubbed the Celebrity Squad, for its investigations into the rich and famous - pitched him into high profile cases, including briefing the Royal Family on the prosecution of Paul Burrell, the former butler of Diana, Princess of Wales. A Met spokesman said that Mr Yates, who has visited the de Menezes family in Brazil, had testified to the IPCC that he was unaware on the Friday that the man shot at Stockwell had been innocent. However, the documents show that Mr Paddick still suspects that senior Met officers knew on Friday that the mistake had been made. Mr Paddick, 47, Britain's most senior openly gay police officer, sprang to prominence when, as bor-ough commander for Lambeth, he pioneered a "softly-softly" approach to cannabis that became a blueprint for national policy. It marked him out as a rising star, but it also made him enemies. Now in charge of the Met's territorial policing division, he stood alongside Sir Ian after the July 7 bombings to appeal for calm. Two weeks later came the failed bombing attempt of July 21. Police marksmen hunting the failed bombers followed Mr de Menezes, 27, and shot him dead at about 10am on July 22. That afternoon at 4pm, Sir Ian told the media that the shooting was "directly linked" to the anti-terrorist operation. However, the following day at 5pm, Scotland Yard admitted that its officers had made a terrible mistake. After a complaint from the de Menezes family, the IPCC - already investigating the shooting - opened a separate inquiry into the commissioner's conduct. According to the documents, Mr Paddick was telephoned by a journalist on St Valentine's Day this year while on duty. Snippets of the conversation were overheard by a junior colleague who, fearing that rules had been broken, reported the matter to the Met's internal affairs division. During the conversation on his mobile phone, Mr Paddick let slip two key pieces of information that could land him, as well as his boss, in trouble. He revealed for the first time that he had recently made a statement to the IPCC's inquiry into the commissioner's conduct. And, without naming Mr Yates, he gave an account of the alleged call to the cricket match. It was not until March 16 that the public learnt that Mr Paddick had given evidence to the IPCC. The news emerged when the BBC home affairs correspondent, Margaret Gilmore, told viewers that an unnamed senior Met officer had told investigators that a member of staff in the commissioner's private office believed that the wrong man had been killed within six hours of the shooting. Later, it was suggested that Mr Paddick had given the IPCC the names of two senior officers who were said to have known on the day. Both are understood to have been called before the IPCC: one denied the charge while the other gave equivocal evidence. The response from Scotland Yard was swift and brutal: "We are satisfied that whatever the reasons for this suggestion being made, it is simply not true." The rebuttal was so damning that Mr Paddick went to his lawyers to discuss the possibility of suing his employer for libel. In a statement defending the charge of making an unauthorised disclosure, Mr Paddick does not claim he was misquoted but maintains his only mistake was in being too open with the journalist. He defends his decision to pass on the cricket match information by describing it as a "rumour", of which some in the media were already aware, in order to deflect the journalist away from the content of his statement to the IPCC. "I should perhaps have merely stated that I was unaware that any other senior officers knew on the Friday - but this was untrue." Scotland Yard said of the cricket allegation: "John Yates made a statement to the IPCC making it clear that he did not know an innocent person had been shot at Stockwell Tube station on that day." --------------------------------------------------- Please help our fight against the New World Order by giving a donation. As bandwidth costs increase, the only way we can stay online and expand is with your support. 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