Clutching 5ft sword, suspect in shooting of hero police officer
‘Family had bad problems’
POSING for the camera, this is the former engineering student suspected of shooting dead policeman Matt Ratana.
Alleged gunman Louis De Zoysa, 23, remains in a critical condition after apparently blasting himself during a tussle with officers after Sgt Ratana was hit in the heart inside his own station last week.
These images of De Zoysa posing with a 5ft medieval sword emerged after claims from friends in his school leavers’ book that he was ‘good with weapons’. And it came as further details were revealed about his life yesterday.
He excelled at the Catholic John Fisher School in Purley, south London, before studying mechanical engineering at University College London – where these images of him with the blade and shield were taken in 2017.
Friends said he was very intelligent but dropped out after just a year.
De Zoysa and his four siblings were brought up by their translator mother and yoga teacher father in Norbury, south London. Friends have previously spoken of their middle-class lifestyle and his younger brother now attends Oxford University.
However, one neighbour who knew the family well yesterday said the De Zoysa house was notorious in the street for loud arguments and aggressive dogs which were bred for money.
The source said that his father Channa, from Sri Lanka, struggled to hold down regular employment.
The neighbour also claimed to have witnessed arguments which spilled out into the street. It backs up reports that De Zoysa’s British mother, Elizabeth, took out a restraining order against her husband in 2015. This was withdrawn last year when they reconciled.
The neighbour added that she filed a police report when De Zoysa was in his early teens, claiming to have heard gun shots from the garden of the property.
‘Some neighbours felt bullied by them,’ she said. ‘The family were known because their dogs would bark all the time. They were like wild guard dogs.
‘I would often hear loud arguments with very strong language. ’
Metropolitan Police officer Sgt Ratana was shot when De Zoysa, who had been arrested for alleged possession of ammunition and Class B drugs in south London, was brought into his police station in Croydon.
Despite being cuffed and searched outside, the suspect is believed to have smuggled a revolver inside and shot Sgt Ratana as he took his temperature to comply with Covid regulations.
Five shots were fired at 2.15am on Friday, including one which left De Zoysa in hospital. Detectives have as yet been unable to speak to him.
The Met Police said searches are continuing at De Zoysa’s family home and more than 30 acres of farmland in Banstead, Surrey. A second man has been arrested in Norwich on suspicion of supplying a firearm.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy said: ‘We’ve traced a number of witnesses who have been able to contribute significant information.’
Girlfriend Su Bushby, 44, who shared a home with Sgt Ratana in Worthing, Sussex, has called him her ‘gentle giant’ and ‘soulmate’.
A fund in the fallen officer’s memory has been set up by the
Metropolitan Police’s Hayes Sports Club.
The native New Zealander, whose mother Mary Young was Scottish, joined Scotland Yard in 1991 and was head coach at
East Grinstead Rugby Club. His grown-up son lives overseas.
Officers in his home country yesterday honoured Sgt Ratana with a haka as part of their Police Remembrance Day.