Murder update: police refute criticisms

4:49pm Tuesday 29th April 2008

Comments (8)   Have your say »

Police have defended themselves amid complaints they have not responded sufficiently to incidents in an area where a 25-year-old man was murdered.

Messages placed on the Braintree and Witham Times website criticised Braintree police for failing to respond to calls about disturbances in Coldnailhurst Avenue, in Bocking, where Alan Reilly, of Trotters Field, Braintree, was stabbed to death on April 22 at about 10pm.

One commenter said they called the police on the night the murder took place about a large number of "unruly" youths in their back-garden, but police failed to show.

And another believed police presence in the area to be very poor, if non-existent.

But Chief Insp Alan Gooden, district commander for Braintree, refuted the claims stressing there was adequate policing in the area and the call about an hour prior to the murder did in fact receive a response and officers attended the scene.

He said the incident an hour before the murder involved youths kicking a football, was not connected to the murder and officers attended within five minutes of the call.