Bird pointed gun at two unarmed police in pursuit

TWO unarmed police officers stared down the barrel of Derrick Bird’s gun as he ran amok in Whitehaven, it has emerged.

The officers were blocked in their van with Bird’s gun pointing at them after pursuing him on his murderous rampage through the town last Wednesday morning.

They managed to escape but lost sight of Bird’s taxi.

The pair had taken over the pursuit from another unarmed officer, who heard shots and commandeered a car to give chase.

He abandoned his pursuit to give first aid to a cab driver Bird had shot as he passed him in his taxi.

Cumbria’s deputy chief constable Stuart Hyde insisted yesterday none of the officers could have stopped Bird, who went on to kill a further nine people.

He said: “This incident was unprecedented and exceptional circumstances were fast-moving and highly dangerous.

“Had any officer or member of staff had the clear opportunity to stop Bird I am confident they would have taken it.”

By the time the first officer at Whitehaven Police Station heard shots, Bird, 52, had already killed his twin David, solicitor Kevin Commons and his friend and colleague Darren Rewcastle.

The first police sighting of Bird came when the neighbourhood policing officer heard shots at around 10.30am.

He found Bird’s grey taxi with a shotgun pointing out of the front passenger window.

He alerted colleagues and then got into the nearest vehicle, driven by a local man, to follow Bird.

He saw Bird slow down as he passed a taxi travelling in the opposite direction. As the two cars passed, Bird shot the driver of the taxi.

The officer went to the assistance of the injured man and the two other officers took over the pursuit.

Details of the pursuits came as inquests into the deaths of Bird’s 12 victims were opened and adjourned.

Coroner David Roberts, said initial postmortems revealed all Bird’s victims died from “wounds from firearm”.