By IRWIN BLOCK

MONTREAL, QUEBEC – It’s more than two years since his son was shot dead by a Montreal police officer in front of a Côte des Neiges mosque.

But Mohamed Bennis has not given up in his efforts to see the police and coroner’s reports so he can learn the details of what happened to his son, Mohamed Anas Bennis, on Dec. 1, 2005. So far, his request has been denied, and Bennis Sr. has received only oral reports.

Police say the officers shot Bennis, 25, after he attacked the officer with a knife, slashing him in the neck and the leg, during a police operation on Kent Ave.

Bennis, who had no criminal record, was walking home after morning prayers at the mosque.

His father, a financial consultant living in Casablanca, Morocco, has hired Montreal lawyer Alain Arsenault to write to provincial Justice Minister Jacques Dupuis and the Quebec coroner’s office to formally request copies of the reports.

At a news conference organized by groups opposed to police brutality, the elder Bennis said yesterday he suspects his son was shot because he was bearded and dressed as a devout Muslim, was caught in an anti-terrorism operation and was mistaken for a terrorist.

A Gazette story two days after the death reported that the officer who shot Bennis was assisting in a Sûreté du Québec operation involving a fraud ring.

Arsenault said he will ask that a public coroner’s inquiry be held so the circumstances of Bennis’s death can be examined.

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