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Christopher Lombard

Age: 30

Sex: male

Date: 1 Dec 1996

Place: Island Nightclub, 300-310 High Road, Ilford

Christopher Lombard was shot in the foyer of the Island Nightclub in High Road, Ilford at about 3.45am on 1 December 1996.

A man was arrested in connection with his murder in March 1997 but was released without charge.

Christopher Lombard had been a doorman at the club.

He had been shot seven times and had received a bullet wound to his head. Two other door supervisors were also shot in the attack but survived.

It was heard that the club had closed its doors at 3am but that the two men had come along at 3.35am and had tried to get in. They were told by other clubbers that the doors had shut at 3am but they knocked on the glass doors to get the attention of the door staff and when they came over, one of the men started shooting at them through the glass doors.

The suspects were caught running away on the video recorder of an unmarked police car that had stopped at some traffic lights nearby.

They had fled off along Green Lane and then got into a silver car that had been parked between Connaught Lane and St Mary's Road. It was said to have then sped off along Green Lane towards Goodmayes and Becontree Heath.

Two e-fits of the suspects were later released.

The person that shot Christopher Lombard was described as a very dark-skinned black man, aged between 17 and 20 and about 5ft 8in tall with hair shaved at the sides and closely cropped on top. He was said to have had a small circular scar above his right eye and another circular scar to the right of his mouth.

The other suspect was described as being of Mediterranean appearance, possibly Greek or Turkish, 5ft 10in tall and aged between 18 and 25 with dark hair, a moustache and wearing a hat and light-coloured top or jacket.

It was said that there had been about 1,600 people at the nightclub at the time.

The police said that they thought that they might have been targeted because of an earlier incident between the men and the door staff.

Christopher Lombard was single and lived alone.

The Island Nightclub is now the Coliseum Suite.


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