My buddy Roger Brereton, a fellow traffic cop and my opposite number at Newbury was murdered by Michael Ryan Seems like only yesterday and the only time in all my years of going to major incidents I actually felt slightly nervous or afraid even. This was Roger's car which was riddled by Ryan as he turned into the cul de sac We had personal issue back in those days. All the black dots you can see are some of the bullet holes. The majority ended up in Roger, but of course we traffic cops were/are expendable as we did/do nothing but book speeders all day. Funny how the majority of coppers killed (in my old force at least) such as more recently Andrew Harper are usually traffic cops..... Anyway, I am teetotal, but if I was a drinker, I would be raising a glass to my old mate Roger (aka Gobby)
I read the Wiki about the Hungerford massacre after your piece above. I suspect there are several people with memories that are being revived at this point. Really illustrates you literally don't know what's round the next corner.
There are many of us (some former colleagues who are no longer with us) along with the Hungerford community who went through the experience. Remember, much of the killing was done before Roger had arrived on scene so the public saw it happening whereas we tended to see the (albeit) devastating aftermath and Ryan had holed himself up in the school. What has not changed over the years were that the press were told to stay away from the school because it was unknown what he was upto and it was thought he may have booby trapped himself. Press decided to ignore that instruction and nearly got shot themselves because they wanted to go mooching about to try and get an exclusive picture of Ryan. Their attitude was "We are the press, you cannot restrict us!" So they were threatened with arrest for obstruction and excluded from the press conference. They were not happy, (we were ) But it taught them a lesson of sorts. But like I said, some things have not changed over the preceding 35 years..
Most people have to earn a living, some get killed working for the press, I worked for the press, I don't condone any violence and take my hat off for those who keep us safe,
I remember the shocking things that happened then. I’ve never seen any pics. The pics fill in a few blanks for us. We know police officers died but I didn’t know they were in cars. I’m guessing the armed response teams were borne out of such terrible incidents. Thanks for sharing your memories.
Only one Police officer was killed (Roger) and he was a fellow Traffic cop, and he responded A) Because he was in a vehicle that allowed him to get there quickly from Newbury. (As a rule, although we were Traffic, it was/is common for Traffic cops to be immediate responders) B) He was a former Hungerford divisional officer so he knew exactly where to go C) Regardless of specialisms, you still offer back up where possible. The Armed response team had been formed some years before as part of the Support group, but they were based at Kidlington and there was a delay getting them to the scene because the Paraffin Budgie developed a fault, so it took 15 minutes longer to get them down there than it should have been as Hungerford is in the south west of the Thames Valley force area and Kidlington was in the northern area (Thames Valley Police is made up of the old constituent forces of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Reading Borough and Oxford City forces) It was a couple of years later that a full time ARV team located in various areas around the force was formed.
