Minutes after the attack that killed his pensioner victim, Michael Charles Brown went back to his ground-floor flat and called 999.
He confessed to killing 73-year-old John Stephen McCarthy, his former friend and neighbour, by stabbing him multiple times on the doorstep of the victim’s flat.
For 45 minutes an unnamed Ambulance Service operator spoke with the killer while paramedics and armed police officers were sent to the scene at Vauxhall Gardens on Vauxhall Street.
After that two police negotiators, Sergeant John Breeze and Inspector Mark Coxshall, were called in to take over the conversation.
Their job was to keep Brown in the flat until armed police officers were in position and ready to prevent the attacker from fleeing or hurting anyone else.
Detective Inspector Steve Langford, deputy senior investigating officer in the case, codenamed Operation Ellis, said all three played a vital role in keeping paramedics and members of the public safe.
‘We had a situation here where a defenceless man was found lying in the street, seriously injured after a quite brutal attack.
‘At that time paramedics and members of the public who were trying to work to save Mr McCarthy’s life did not know where the perpetrator was or if he could attack someone else,’ he said.
‘What we could not afford was to have Brown, in the state of mind he was in, running around Vauxhall Gardens. The ambulance operator did a fantastic job and we could not praise them highly enough.
‘What they and the negotiators did was speak to him to a point where he gave himself up to armed police and no one else was hurt.’
Det Insp Langford explained that at the end of the shift that night – Friday 21 October last year – frontline officers were debriefed on what they saw. Days later paramedics and emergency department doctors and nurses were also called in to discuss the incident.
‘What did feature during the debrief was the vulnerability that the staff and emergency services felt. We were able to tell them that while they were on the ground we had trained negotiators on the phone to Brown as well as firearms officers patrolling the area.
‘They felt reassured by that,’ the detective added.
Man jailed for life for stabbing neighbour: Click here
