Mark Duggan shooting: Hutchinson-Foster guilty of supplying gun

A man has been found guilty of supplying a gun to Mark Duggan, who was shot dead by police.

Mr Duggan, 29, was shot by officers in Tottenham, north London, on 4 August 2011 and a gun was found nearby, a trial at the Old Bailey heard.

Kevin Hutchinson-Foster, 30, had denied selling or transferring a prohibited firearm to Mr Duggan.

Mr Duggan's death sparked riots in Tottenham, which led to disorder in a number of English cities and towns.

During the trial the jury heard Mr Duggan collected the BBM Bruni Model 92 handgun in a shoebox just 15 minutes before he was killed.

Prosecutor Edward Brown QC told the court: "The death of Mr Duggan has been regarded as the event that sparked the riots in north London, which then spread across London and then to other cities and which attracted widespread publicity in the United Kingdom and abroad."

Mark Duggan was shot dead by police in Tottenham, north London, on 4 August 2011

He told the jury it was not their task to decide the "rights and wrongs" of Mr Duggan's shooting, which will be examined at the inquest into his death, set to take place in September.

Hutchinson-Foster has admitted using the same gun to beat barber Peter Osadebay at a barber's shop in Dalston, east London, just six days before Mr Duggan's death.

The defendant, a cannabis user with convictions for possession of cocaine and heroin with intent to supply, claimed Mr Duggan had wanted his help to sell some cannabis.

He said that was why his DNA was found on the gun when it was retrieved from Ferry Lane, along with traces of Mr Osadebay's blood.

According to the BBC's Danny Shaw the case has helped clarify events leading up to the shooting of Mr Duggan and the inquest into his death can now go ahead.

Armed police, who gave evidence anonymously, described how they had opened fire on Mr Duggan because they saw him get out of a taxi holding a loaded gun.

The officer responsible for the two shots that fatally wounded Mr Duggan said: "I had an honest-held belief that Mark Duggan was going to shoot me or one of my colleagues, so I brought my MP5 (sub-machine gun) up to the shooting position."

'Hard stop'

The officer, known only as V53, shot Mr Duggan in the chest and arm.

He told the jury: "Mark Duggan then fell to the floor. I then closed the suspect down."

The court heard Mr Duggan had been under police surveillance before the shooting.

A taxi driver, who also gave evidence anonymously, collected Mr Duggan from Hoxton, east London, and took him to an address in Leyton, where he saw his passenger collect a box from another man.

Asked if he could remember the events clearly, the taxi driver said: "It was such an incident that a person cannot forget about these things, even at night."

He detailed the "hard stop" carried out by police, who surrounded the cab, forcing it to halt.

Police descended on the halted minicab and the driver said he saw his passenger get out and run, followed by the gun shots.

The court heard the driver was was pulled from his cab and and forced to lie face-down on the ground with his hands tied behind his back, where he saw Mr Duggan's body lying nearby.

The driver said: "His mouth was open.

"He was bleeding from the front. They were trying to remove his clothes."

An Independent Police Complaints Commission inquiry into the shooting is on-going.

Chief Supt Dean Haydon, from the Metropolitan Police's Trident Gang Crime Command which tackles gang and gun crime, said: "The Kevin Hutchinson-Foster trial has primarily been about the supply of an illegal firearm and I welcome the verdict of the jury in this case today."

Hutchinson-Foster will be sentenced on 26 February.