Four police attacked

A SENIOR police officer has spoken at his shock over four Runcorn officers being assaulted in two days.

Superintendent Peter Crowcroft tweeted on Monday to say he arrived in the town to discover the incidents had taken place, describing them as ‘unacceptable’.

He said staff welfare was being looked after.

His comments received backing from user Cheshire Girl @ Denise_55 who said the assaults were ‘totally unacceptable, disgraceful’.

A Cheshire police spokeswoman said an officer suffered minor injuries after responding to reports of a disturbance on South Road in Weston Point at 8.55pm on Monday, May 5.

During the incident, officers arrested a 25-year-old woman.

The following day, police stopped and searched a vehicle on the Rocksavage Expressway at 12.45am on Tuesday, May 6.

A 30 year-old man from Salford was arrested for possession with intent to supply a Class B drug cannabis and assaulting a police officer, who went to hospital as a precaution.

The Police Federation has said physical and verbal assaults on police officers are ‘commonplace’ and incidents are often under-reported and that historically it has been difficult to gauge the extent of the issue.

The association said that it is estimated that previously, more than 23,000 officers were assaulted every year, but latest welfare data suggests there were more than 2m unarmed physical assaults on officers in 12 months and a further 302,842 with a deadly weapon during the same period.

It is now pressing for longer sentences for culprits. OR CALL