Britain’s Most Wanted Man Baits Police Into Chasing Him for One Week
Raoul Moat was a 37-year-old auto mechanic, bouncer, and tree surgeon. Moat had been arrested 12 times already for seven separate offenses, one of those for common assault. Moat was also known to have anti-police sentiment and didn’t take to imprisonment well.
While Moat was in prison, Samantha Stobbart, his girlfriend used it as an opportunity to break up with him. Fearing not only for her safety but that of her daughter, she told Moat that she had begun seeing a new partner. He was 29-year-old Christopher Brown and she claimed he was a police officer. In reality, Brown was not a police officer at all, but a karate instructor.
Moat was released from Durham prison on July 1st, 2010. The next day, prison staff notified the police that Moat may try to harm his ex-girlfriend, Stobbart. They took no action. Raul Moat found them. He crouched down and waited outside an open window while listening to their conversation.
Around 2:40 am, Brown left Samantha’s home and was immediately confronted by Moat and his shotgun. Moat shot Brown twice in the neck and chest, then reloaded before firing a final fatal shot at his head. Moat then fired through the living room window at Stobbart. She was hit in the arm and abdomen, but not fatally wounded. Stobbart’s mother called the police and they were quick to arrive.
Brown had died from Moat’s fatal shot, but Stobbart was rushed to the hospital. There, she underwent emergency liver surgery while protected by armed guards. At 12:45 am on July 4th, less than 24 hours after killing Christopher Brown, who he believed to be a police officer, Moat would reappear. He snuck up on police constable David Rathband. As Rathband was sitting in his patrol car by a roundabout in Newcastle, Moat shot Rathband once in the face and he slumped forward. He decided to play dead, hoping that Moat would believe he had been killed and leave him alone.
Rathband had become a national hero after surviving his encounter with Moat, but Rathband found himself unable to cope with his new disability. His marriage to his wife broke down and he moved out of their home. In this time, Rathband made several threats to kill himself. David Rathband did go through with it. He hung himself in his home in Blythe on February 29th, 2012. Rathband’s funeral a few weeks later would be attended by his family and fellow police.
It was reported that Moat had called the police 12 minutes before shooting Rathband, taunting them and telling them he was about to kill a police officer. He called again 50 minutes after leaving Rathband for dead. Moat sounded remorseless about his actions and complained that the police weren’t taking him seriously enough. They informed him that Brown had not even been a police officer and urged him to turn himself in for the sake of his three children but Moat would not turn himself in.
The manhunt became one of the largest in UK history. Northumbria police also confirmed they’d received a 49-page letter Moat had left for a friend on July 3rd. In it, Moat warned that the police were going to pay for what they’d done. He also said the public did not need to fear him, but the police should as he wouldn’t stop till he was dead.
The police then relayed a message to Moat from Samantha Stobbart. She urged him to turn himself in if he still had any love for her or their child. She also said she’d lied about Christopher Brown being a police officer because she was afraid of Moat. In response, Moat updated his Facebook status with a hit list of victims, including Stobbart and her family. He said he’d take out any police that got in his way.
At 10:50 pm, on July 5th in Seaton, Delaval, a man resembling Moat robbed a fish and chip shop before fleeing. The police were looking for a black Lexus believed to have been driven by Moat. The car was found without Moat in the town of Rothbury on the morning of July 6th. A five-mile air exclusion zone and a two-mile ground exclusion zone were set up by police. It was also believed that Moat had taken two hostages, though this was later proven untrue.
Police stormed an abandoned farm called Pike House when the owners noticed that one of the building's boarded-up windows had been removed. Moat was not found. Armed officers were sent to local schools and the students were kept in lockdown as well.
On the morning of July 7th, police still believed Moat was hiding out in the countryside around Rothbury. A tent thought to belong to Moat was discovered in Carrington, about two miles northwest of Rothbury. Within it, they found an eight-page letter Moat had written to Samantha Stobbart. In the letter, Moat continued to claim that Christopher Brown did have a police connection and that Stobbart and the police were lying to him. The police again publicly stated that Brown was not connected to the police in any way. Besides the letter, no other trace of Moat was found. But now they had solid proof that he was in the Rothbury area.
Paul Stobbart, Samantha’s father, released a video asking for Moat to turn himself in. The police also confirmed that the July 5th Fish and Chip Shop robbery had been Moat. There, Moat had claimed he wouldn’t stop killing police until he was dead. Northumbria police refused to elaborate further at the time. However, it would later be revealed that they had asked the media to stop reporting on information about Moat’s private life at all.
In the early evening of July 9, residents of Rothbury were told to remain indoors as a major security operation was underway. It was reported that a man matching Moat’s description had been cornered by the police as he held a sawed -off shotgun to his head. The suspect was publicly confirmed to be Moat. Nearby residents felt as though they were under siege.
Moat’s best friend, Tony Laidler, was brought in by the police in the hopes that he could talk Moat into surrendering. It did not work. At one point during the negotiations, English footballer Paul Gascoigne, nicknamed Gazza, showed up at the crime scene. He told the police he was actually Moat’s friend, which must have been odd for some of the officers who likely knew who he was. He would go on to sue The Sun, a British tabloid, for its coverage of him during the standoff. Gazza would later say that he’d convinced himself he and Moat were friends during a f***ing binge. He had no recollection at all of showing up to the site of the standoff, at least until he checked his phone the next day. He’d go on to say that it was evident by his actions that he was desperately in need of help.
Back at the standoff with Moat, July 9th became July 10th. At 1:34 a.m., a police spokesperson said that shots had been fired and that the suspect had sustained a gunshot wound. Police had jumped on the suspect and an ambulance was moving in.
Northumbria police released a statement that no shots had been fired by officers and that the suspect had shot himself. No police officers were injured. Moat was taken by ambulance to Newcastle General Hospital, but was announced dead shortly after he arrived at 2:20 a.m. With that, the manhunt for Raoul Moat ended.