Improving police accountability

Help us to bring a court case against the IOPC with the aim of requiring the IOPC to apply its own low ‘threshold test’ correctly in this and all future deaths and serious injuries at the hands of the police.

We want the IOPC to more regularly commence disciplinary and criminal investigations of police officers immediately after it begins working on serious cases such as this. This should lead to improved levels of police accountability and increased confidence in the IOPC in how it investigates cases of death or serious injury.

Who are we? We are the family of Oladeji Omishore, made up of his parents, siblings and extended family.

On 4th June 2022, our beloved Oladeji, fondly called Deji, died tragically following contact with two Metropolitan Police officers on Chelsea Bridge.

Deji was known to his family as kind, fun-loving, talented, and musically gifted. Yet, on 4th June, during a suspected mental health crisis, dressed in a tshirt and shorts and holding only his plastic cigarette lighter, he was tasered multiple times by a Met officer and he subsequently fell into the River Thames from the bridge, to his death. Most of the incident was caught on camera by a driver who stopped on the bridge, and the film has been widely circulated on social media.

Deji was only a few moments’ walk from his home and seems to have been vulnerable and frightened. We believe that the two MET police officers who confronted him used repeated, excessive, unjustified force. We want those officers to explain why they did not use their training to de-escalate the situation, instead of taking the actions that led to his tragic death.

 Summary - We are pursuing a judicial review claim against the IOPC for their continuing decisions to treat the two officers as witnesses to the investigation and not subjects of the investigation, and not to classify the investigation as a conduct or criminal investigation.

Call to action - We are raising funds to pay for the legal costs of pursuing this Judicial Review, which is aimed at achieving an effective investigation and proper accountability for the unnecessary loss of an innocent soul. 

Your kind donations will support our critical work to promote the protection of all individual human rights both now and in the future, with the IOPC being required to use their investigative powers appropriately in this case and others.

All donations will be administered by our legal team. We are represented by Hickman and Rose solicitors and Nick Armstrong of Matrix Chambers.

What are we trying to achieve? – The quashing of what in our view is an unlawful and irrational decision by the IOPC to treat the two Met police Officers as witnesses rather than to classify the investigation as a conduct or criminal investigation. This is important to ensure an effective and properly safeguarded investigation from the outset not, as sometimes happens, one that comes too late. It seems clear to us that the low threshold for a conduct investigation set out in the IOPC’s own published guidance is met in this case (the test is where there is an ‘indication’ that the officers may have (a) committed a criminal offence or (b) behaved in a manner which would justify disciplinary proceedings, or that there may have been the infringement of Deji’s rights under Articles 2 or 3 of the European Convention). We think that without a robust and fearless conduct/criminal investigation, and a proper understanding of what happened, and lessons learned, there is a real risk that a death like Deji’s will be repeated.

What is the next step in the case? – We have served a Letter Before Claim on the IOPC, requesting that they review their approach to this investigation. We are now taking the case to the High Court by issuing a judicial review claim.

How much we are raising and why? Our fundraising target was initially £10,000, which covered issuing the claim and the permission stage. We have amended the stretch target to £50,000 to cover the costs of the case proceeding to trial. Any unused funds will be dealt with under the Crowd Justice unused funds policy.

If we get permission to pursue the challenge, we can apply for a ‘costs capping order’ to try and ensure that any adverse costs exposure don’t exceed any money that we can raise. If we are unable to raise sufficient funds to meet a costs capping order, it is likely that we will be forced to discontinue the claim.

On behalf of the Omishore family, thank you.