The 2010 Northumbria Police manhunt was a major police operation conducted across Tyne and Wear and Northumberland with the objective of apprehending fugitive Raoul Moat. After killing one person and wounding two others in a two-day shooting spree in July 2010, the 37-year-old ex-prisoner went on the run for nearly a week. The manhunt concluded when Moat died by suicide having shot himself near the town of Rothbury, Northumberland, following a six-hour standoff with armed police officers under the command of the Northumbria Police.
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Moat’s victims were ex-girlfriend Samantha Stobbart, her new partner Chris Brown, and police officer David Rathband. Stobbart was hospitalized and Brown was killed, while Rathband remained in hospital for nearly three weeks and was permanently blinded before dying by suicide on 29 February 2012. Moat shot the three with a sawn-off shotgun, two days after his release from Durham Prison.
After six days on the run, Moat was recognized by police and contained in the open, leading to a standoff. After nearly six hours of negotiation, Moat was shot with an experimental “wireless long-range electric shock weapon” firing electrified rounds, which proved ineffective. Moat then shot himself in the head; he was later pronounced dead at Newcastle General Hospital. Following an inquest, it was ruled by a jury that Moat’s death was a suicide, and Northumbria Police were found to have been at no fault.
The manhunt began after the shootings of Stobbart and Brown in the early hours of 3 July 2010 in Birtley. Nearly 22 hours later, the shooting of traffic police officer Rathband, parked in East Denton, was linked to Moat, who was believed to have held a grudge against the police after Stobbart had lied about being in a relationship with a police officer. Shortly after his release from prison, Moat posted threats to police and others on his Facebook profile.
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