Police identify suspects for possible Grenfell manslaughter charges

The police investigation into the Grenfell Tower fire has identified potential suspects for offences of corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter, Scotland Yard has said.

But it said there were no guarantees that criminal charges would be brought over the disaster, whose second anniversary falls this Friday.

Survivors and bereaved families will have to wait until at least 2021 for police to formally ask prosecutors for charging decisions because police want to wait for the end of the delayed public inquiry.

Police said on Monday they had interviewed people under criminal caution in connection with suspected manslaughter and health and safety offences. It is the first time the Met has confirmed that anyone from the plethora of companies and organisations involved in Grenfell has been identified as a potential suspect for the most serious offences.

Det Supt Matt Bonner, who is leading the investigation, said: “The offences being investigated … will include or could include, at the top end of the scale, individual gross negligence manslaughter offences, corporate manslaughter offences and health and safety offences committed by organisations and individuals.”

Bonner said people had agreed to be interviewed under caution and hence there had been no need to use police powers of arrest.

“To date we have conducted 13 interviews under caution. We plan to do more,” he said. “The investigation continues at pace. The focus of the investigation remains all aspects of the construction, the refurbishment and the management of Grenfell Tower and a review of the emergency response on the night.”

The Met said it had not sought search warrants because it was satisfied that the material it needed had been handed over. It has 45m documents in digital form as well as 14,500 physical exhibits.

Detectives have seized documents from organisations and in some cases examined backup servers to compare what was stored in case anything has been deleted or gone missing.

The fire in west London on 14 June 2017 killed 72 people. The criminal investigation involves 180 officers and staff working full-time. The Home Office has granted the Met £4m for additional costs.

Commander Stuart Cundy said: “Even now, coming up to the two-year anniversary, there is no guarantee that we can give that there will be criminal charges. There is a guarantee that they [those who lost loved ones and survivors] have our absolute personal commitment to do what we can to make sure this investigation is fearless, secures all the evidence that it can and puts that evidence before the Crown Prosecution Service.”

He added: “It is one of the largest and one of the most complex criminal investigations that we have ever undertaken.”