McCANN AND OTHERS v. THE UNITED KINGDOM JUDGMENT 28 5. The Coroner’s address to the jury 120. At the conclusion of the inquest, the Coroner addressed the jury in respect of the applicable law, in particular, Article 2 of the Gibraltar Constitution (see paragraph 133 below). As inquest proceedings did not allow for the parties to make submissions to the jury, he summed up the respective propositions of the applicants’ representatives and the representatives of the soldiers and the Crown referring to the evidence. He concluded from the evidence given by the soldiers that when they opened fire they shot intending to kill and directed the jury as to the range of possible verdicts: "... If the soldiers set out that day with the express intent to kill that would be murder and it would be right to return a verdict of unlawfully killed. Example two: were you to find in the case of Savage (or any of the other two for that matter) that he was shot on the ground in the head after effectively being put out of action, that would be murder if you come to the conclusion that the soldiers continued to finish him off. In both cases they intended to kill not in self-defence or in the defence of others or in the course of arrest ... so it is murder and you will return a verdict of unlawfully killed. If in this second example you were to conclude that it is killing in pursuance of force used which was more than reasonably necessary, then the verdict should also be killed unlawfully but it would not have been murder. The third example I offer is precisely of that situation. If you accept the account that the soldiers’ intention was genuinely to arrest (in the sense that they were to apprehend the three suspects and hand them over live to the Gibraltar police force) and that the execution of the arrest went wrong and resulted in the three deaths because either (a) force was used when it was not necessary or (b) the force that was used was more than was reasonably necessary, then that would not be murder ... and the verdict would be, as I say, unlawfully killed. Example four: if you are satisfied that the soldiers were acting properly but nevertheless the operation was mounted to encompass the deaths of the three suspects to the ignorance of the soldiers, then you would also bring in a verdict of unlawfully killed. ...So there are only three verdicts reasonably open to you and these are: (a) Killed unlawfully, that is unlawful homicide. (b) Killed lawfully, that is justifiable, reasonable homicide. (c) Open verdict. Remembering that you must be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt where the verdict of unlawfully killed is concerned, there are two situations to consider. The first concerning the soldiers themselves, the second if they have been the unwitting tools of a plot to dispose of the three suspects. As to the first concerning the soldiers themselves, I must tell you that if you are not satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that they have killed unlawfully, you have then to decide whether your verdict should be an open verdict or one of justifiable homicide. My direction to you is that you should bring in a verdict of justifiable homicide, i.e. killed lawfully, because in the nature of the circumstances of this incident that is what you will have resolved if you do not return a verdict of unlawful homicide in respect