Police chief slams Raoul Moat coverage

A senior police chief has criticised the way that TV broadcasters devoted live rolling news coverage to the last stand of fugitive gunman Raoul Moat.

Writing on his blog last month, Greater Manchester Police Chief Constable Peter Fahy accepted that the media had a "legitimate" interest in the case.

However, he said that the demands of 24-hour news coverage often resulted in officers spending half their time dealing with the demands of the media.

Former nightclub bouncer Moat is understood to have shot himself in Northumberland on July 10 after a six-hour stand-off with police.

He went on the run after shooting his ex-girlfriend Sam Stobbart and killing her new partner Chris Brown, as well as blinding police officer David Rathband.

In his blog post on the Greater Manchester force's website, Fahy said: "The media have a legitimate interest in police operations. It cannot be right however that the last hours of a man's life are broadcast on live television with members of his family looking on.

"It cannot be right that an officer commanding such an incident has to consider how it might look on television as if he/she was a film director."

Fahy said that the advent of rolling news coverage has had a "profound effect" on policing by placing greater demands on officers to deal with the media.

"Particular cases grab the public imagination and are then played out in the media in detail round the clock," he said.

"In such a case well over 50% of the time of the officer commanding the incident will probably be spent handling the media.

"This includes monitoring and reacting to what the media are saying about the case and things like the statements being made by witnesses in front of the cameras."

In July, it emerged that TV presenter and survival expert Ray Mears was drafted in by police to assist the manhunt for Moat in the Northumberland countryside.