Relatives of Jean Charles de Menezes stood before his inquest jury in protest yesterday wearing T-shirts saying: "Unlawful killing, your legal right to decide."

On the day the jury were sent out to consider their verdict after 35 days of evidence about the fatal shooting of De Menezes by police, the dead man's cousins withdrew from the hearing.

Earlier this week the coroner, Sir Michael Wright, told the jury he was not going to allow them to consider unlawful killing as one of their verdict options. He said unlawful killing was tantamount to accusing an individual or individuals of murder or manslaughter and was not a verdict that would be available to them.

He also said it was not available should they consider that the death occurred as a result of a series of decisions and mistaken beliefs on the part of the Metropolitan police as an organisation. He left the jury with two verdicts to consider: lawful killing and an open verdict.

Wright told the jurors just as they sat down yesterday that lawyers for the De Menezes family would no longer be present at the hearing. "You will notice Mr Mansfield and Miss Hill and their instructing solicitors are no longer in their places," Wright said.

"The evidence and legal submissions are now all over and we have all had their assistance throughout these very important stages. But I understand that from this point they will no longer be here. There's absolutely no difficulty about that. No disrespect is meant by it to anyone."

Seconds later Vivian Menezes Figueiredo, Alessandro Pereira, Patricia da Silva Armani and Erionaldo da Silva stood up and removed their coats to unveil their T-shirts. They walked slowly and in silence from their seats at the back of the courtroom towards the jury. Standing in line, they waited 30 seconds in full view of the jury before filing out of the court.