Humberside Police One Punch campaign
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00:00 (ominous music)
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00:28 - It's probably a misconception
00:42 that people think you need an excessive use of force
00:44 to actually be able to kill someone.
00:46 That's just not the case.
00:47 These aren't sustained attacks we're talking about here.
00:49 We're talking about one single momentary loss of,
00:53 loss of control, loss of temper, and one punch.
00:56 My name's Alan Curtis.
01:03 I'm a detective superintendent
01:04 in the major crime team in Humberside Police.
01:07 So all the circumstances in all these different scenes
01:09 are unique, all the victims involved are all unique,
01:12 but if we were talking in general terms
01:14 around one punch manslaughterers,
01:16 what we're normally talking about are two men
01:20 outside a pub, club, or bar
01:22 who have generally had a drink,
01:24 who have got into a spontaneous argument with each other,
01:27 and one of the men punches the other man,
01:30 who has then been rendered unconscious
01:32 and had an accelerated fall to the floor
01:35 onto a hard surface such as concrete, a curb,
01:39 sort of anything unyielding on the bottom,
01:41 which has caused this catastrophic head injury,
01:44 which generally is what these men die of.
01:47 Dealing with these types of incidents,
01:49 we get to know the families.
01:50 It's always a tragic situation,
01:52 and it's just massively difficult for them,
01:54 not just in the initial instant itself
01:58 and what happens in the initial aftermath
02:00 and the shock of that,
02:01 but invariably there's a court process at the end,
02:03 and that can be up to sort of 12 months,
02:06 maybe longer in some cases.
02:08 So what you might have is people that have gone out
02:11 drinking with their family members.
02:13 They might be witnesses to these incidents.
02:15 They might be there and present
02:16 when the person's being assaulted.
02:18 They might be with them in the ambulance.
02:20 They might be up at hospital.
02:22 We might have family that might have absolutely no idea
02:25 whatsoever that their loved one's being assaulted
02:28 and they're in either a critical condition
02:30 or that they're in fact deceased.
02:32 - My name's Stephen A. Kester.
02:35 Scott was my son.
02:36 Yeah, Scott was a very popular lad.
02:44 He had a wide selection of friends.
02:48 He liked his boxing, any sort of sports and all that lot.
02:51 He was a family man.
02:52 I had a real good relationship with him.
02:54 We used to speak every other day on the telephone with him.
02:57 - My name's Debbie A. Kester and I was Scott's mum.
03:00 Growing up, Scott was quite a shy boy.
03:02 He had lots of friends at school,
03:04 but he was quite shy as a person
03:08 and it seemed to come out of his shell
03:09 as he got into his teenage years
03:12 and he just loved spending time with his family as well,
03:15 with Ella, his four-year-old daughter.
03:18 - I'm Naomi Allen and Scott A. Kester was my partner.
03:21 Yeah, Scott, he was funny.
03:26 He was my best friend.
03:28 So when we had Ella, it'd become me, Scott and Ella.
03:33 We was like a little team.
03:35 - And Ella was staying over.
03:39 It was a Friday night and was all in bed.
03:42 It was about one o'clock in the morning.
03:45 I could hear a telephone ringing
03:46 and it was the police trying to get a hold of us
03:49 and to let us know that he'd been in a serious altercation.
03:52 - So obviously my mind started racing what had happened
03:56 and everything like that.
03:58 And then I knew something was wrong
04:00 because the police car turned up from Withernsea,
04:03 which isn't far from us, in a matter of minutes.
04:06 And then he was taken me to the hospital
04:07 on his blues and twos.
04:09 We was going some, you know, 80, 90 mile.
04:13 I was flying down and I thought, I started thinking to myself,
04:16 something's not right here.
04:17 I thought maybe a little fight or he fell over or something.
04:19 So I started to panic a bit then.
04:20 I arrived at the hospital.
04:22 Naomi's partner was already there.
04:24 And I was met by another,
04:26 I think it was a detective if I remember.
04:28 And they took me through and Scott was all wired up
04:30 and all that lot.
04:31 And then soon as I saw him, I knew something wasn't right.
04:34 The police officer I spoke to, he says,
04:36 "It's serious, Steve, you know, be prepared."
04:39 I said, "Well, just be straight with me."
04:40 And he was.
04:41 And he said, "I think it's serious, Steve.
04:43 "He's not gonna pull out of this."
04:45 And then I went through and when I saw him,
04:46 he was all tubed up and monitors on him and that.
04:50 And he just didn't look like Scott.
04:52 He was just like a shell.
04:54 And it was heartbreaking really when I saw it.
04:56 - And when Steve went with the police officer,
05:01 obviously I was left alone thinking what was happening.
05:03 I didn't know what was going on.
05:05 And then about an hour later,
05:07 I got a call from the consultant at the hospital
05:10 saying that Scott was really poorly.
05:13 They was doing further tests,
05:14 but he was in a serious condition.
05:16 Yeah, and it was just horrendous.
05:20 It was the worst night of my life.
05:22 I just can't describe how I felt.
05:23 - And they told us that there was no,
05:27 like, reaction to any of the tests.
05:32 I think that's sort of when it all
05:34 just goes into a blur for me.
05:36 The police knocked on my door.
05:39 And originally I thought Scott had left his keys.
05:44 I remember thinking it won't be that bad.
05:49 It's Scott.
05:49 He was a big lad.
05:54 He was like my security, so something like that
05:59 couldn't happen to him.
06:03 That's what I was thinking.
06:05 - It hit me like a ton of bricks.
06:07 I was scared.
06:09 I started panicking about Ella, his daughter.
06:12 We said, "There's nothing we can do.
06:14 "It's just the way he fell.
06:16 "There's no way back for him.
06:17 "You're gonna have to make a decision eventually.
06:22 "Obviously say your goodbyes.
06:23 "You're gonna have to give us the okay
06:25 "when it's ready for you."
06:26 When you actually look at that,
06:29 there's something inside you just leaves you.
06:31 It's like, it's something missing.
06:33 He was my only son.
06:35 To think that we went into hospital
06:38 and Scott was still alive.
06:39 He was 31 years old.
06:41 He had a young family.
06:42 And to leave the hospital basically with a memory box.
06:49 It was awful.
06:51 - So on the car ride to my mum's,
06:57 that's all I could think about.
06:59 Told her that her, that daddy had got poorly
07:04 and that he'd gone to heaven.
07:06 - The devastation he left behind,
07:11 such as my granddaughter.
07:13 I mean, any time we're birthed,
07:17 I take her to the cemetery.
07:18 She should be with her dad.
07:21 You know what I mean?
07:21 And it's heartbreaking.
07:24 (somber music)
07:26 - I used to ring him every hour
07:37 just to see where he was and what he was doing.
07:41 Then about 10 o'clock he was,
07:44 "I'm getting a taxi.
07:46 "I'm coming home or I'm getting a bus.
07:49 "If he's getting a bus, then I should go and meet him."
07:52 (somber music)
07:55 - William Davis, I'm Gareth's father.
07:59 - William Davis, Gareth's brother.
08:04 - Well, he used to say, "He's just a jackal giant.
08:07 "He'd do it for anybody."
08:09 I mean, if somebody went,
08:10 and especially a stranger went to him and said,
08:13 "I got a pound or two."
08:16 He'd just give 'em it.
08:16 - Well, he was quiet most of the time,
08:19 unless it was with people he knew.
08:22 - Anyone stopped talking.
08:23 - From five o'clock, when football left,
08:27 I never stopped ringing him for every hour.
08:29 And he answered me twice.
08:32 One at seven o'clock, telling me where he was.
08:35 One at nine o'clock.
08:37 He said, "I don't know what I'm doing, Dad.
08:40 "But I'll let you know."
08:41 And that was it.
08:42 10 o'clock I rung, 11 o'clock I rung, 12 o'clock, that.
08:47 And that happens from one in the morning.
08:51 The police, well, I got a telephone call.
08:54 And they said, "You better get through real quick."
08:57 But when I got there,
08:59 the two police officers was there.
09:02 They said, "It's bad.
09:04 "But before you go in, see him, it's bad."
09:09 And what was it, a week after?
09:11 He called me in.
09:14 - Yeah.
09:15 - And said, "We're,"
09:16 he said, "We're selling the machine off."
09:19 We had to go.
09:21 And the doctors changed the mounds.
09:23 They said, "No, we might be able to help him."
09:25 - One of the nurses saw his fingers moving.
09:28 (somber music)
09:32 (birds chirping)
09:35 - That arm's dead.
09:50 It's, you can't move it.
09:53 I mean, all the time I was in Tassel Hill.
09:57 They'd use this one, but they won't move that.
09:59 And it's just like that.
10:01 But while I've been here, I've been,
10:03 I've always done it all, done it myself.
10:07 But every time I crossed that, it would fart.
10:11 And he, "Oh, it hurts."
10:14 I said, "It will hurt."
10:16 I said, "You haven't done nothing with it, Gareth."
10:19 I said, "It will hurt."
10:20 But I don't start with, I did fart.
10:23 And I used to scream in my hand, there was nothing.
10:26 No.
10:28 And then I'd say, the next day I went and I did 10.
10:31 And the same thing, squeeze me hand, no.
10:34 Then the next day I did 15.
10:35 Now I'm doing 45, 50.
10:38 And he's still squeezing me hand and I can feel it.
10:42 And I think he can come home.
10:43 Well, he's not coming home.
10:46 I keep saying, "This is your arm, no."
10:50 But no.
10:51 It's that, half of me,
10:54 half of his mother.
10:59 But I've got that on top of me, no.
11:02 - Your mother won't even go out.
11:07 - No.
11:08 - She's got it in her head, sometime he's gonna come home.
11:12 We have to keep telling her.
11:14 That's it, he won't be coming home.
11:16 Sometimes she still won't believe it in her own head.
11:21 We just have to keep trying.
11:26 - I go every day.
11:29 I mean, I cry every day.
11:33 Now that he's gone.
11:37 - Well done.
11:40 - We're all parents and all humans at the end of the day.
11:51 And it's quite difficult to see them going through this.
11:54 So the strength that they show,
11:57 really is kind of testament to how they are as people.
12:00 These are regular people that are just involved.
12:03 People might think, "Oh, it's youths going out
12:08 "and it's kids fighting and it's kind of in that space."
12:11 When actually it's really not.
12:13 It's generally just normal people that are out drinking
12:17 that then have these arguments and confrontations
12:19 over something so silly, so insignificant and so innocuous.
12:23 And that one decision has then just changed
12:26 everyone's lives.
12:27 So if you are heading out this Christmas,
12:33 by all means, enjoy yourself.
12:35 But if you are getting involved
12:36 in a confrontational situation, stop, think and walk away.
12:40 'Cause you could be saving your own and someone else's life.
12:44 - How it happens, whoever started it,
12:48 try and ignore them and walk away.
12:51 - All I can say is, don't let this happen to you.
12:55 If you get into a position where you feel intimidated
12:58 or anything like that, just walk away.
13:01 At least you're there the next day.
13:03 Don't go through what we've been through.
13:05 - Stop and think and walk away and think about our story.
13:09 If it can happen to Scott, it can happen to anybody.
13:12 - It's just going to ruin a lot of people's lives
13:16 if it comes to a devastating conclusion like Scott's story.
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