A series of hit and run incidents had occurred in the West of Cardiff which involved the tragic death of Karina Menzies and the attempted murder of a number of other victims, many of whom were young children. A man drove his van deliberately at and collided with four separate groups of people along an 8 mile route. Children were among each group and serious injuries were caused to many of the victims. During one of these incidents the driver drove at Karina three times before driving away.
The man then assaulted a number of adults at a fuel station with a steering lock before deliberately driving at two women who had confronted him for damaging their vehicle. They were dragged for a considerable distance under his van and suffered life changing injuries as a result.
Due to the multiple collisions that had happened and were still ongoing, there was a lot of information being circulated. Sgt Stephens was instrumental in collating this information and deploying his resources to the many scenes, advising officers in the vicinity of their powers and options to stop the van. His actions directly contributed to the van being successfully stopped and he was pivotal in managing the multiple scenes that resulted from the incident.
PC Haworth made his way to the last known location. Spotting the van and as it came to a junction the officer drove his patrol car in front of the van in an attempt to box it in. In doing so the officer deliberately put himself in harm’s way. He then jumped out of the patrol car and tried to smash the van windows but his patrol car was rammed out of the way.
PC Giles was also in tactical pursuit and had been advised to stop the van by any means. The officer matched the speed of the suspect and used a tactic that caused the van to destabilise and come to a halt. The officer risked significant injury if this had gone wrong. PC Simmonds assisted in a hard stop tactic and arrest of the driver of the van despite a determined effort put up to resist.
All four officers exhibited considerable courage and professionalism in capturing this ruthless criminal on the rampage.