The suspect in the triple knife attack in Nottingham was arrested after allegedly approaching police officers with a knife, it has been revealed.
The 31-year-old man remained in custody on Wednesday as detectives try to establish why a man went on the rampage stabbing three people to death and driving into pedestrians with a van he had stolen from one of his victims.
Counter-terrorism officers are assisting the investigation by Nottinghamshire police, but multiple sources say the suspect’s mental health is an active line of investigation, as police try to determine a motive.
The Guardian understands that investigators believe the suspect was residing in Nottingham and had previous links to London.
Police gave a sequence of events for the series of attacks that left two 19-year-old University of Nottingham students, Grace O’Malley-Kumar and Barnaby Webber, dead.
The third stabbing victim was Ian Coates, a school caretaker in his 60s, whose van the man stole and then used to drive into pedestrians near the Theatre Royal, injuring one man critically, as well as two others.
Nottinghamshire police said by piecing together “extensive CCTV coverage and eyewitness accounts” they could now track the attacker’s movements. At 4.04am on Tuesday they were called to Ilkeston Road, where the two students lay in the street, unresponsive after being attacked by a man with a knife. Police said they attended quickly.
The man then tried to get into a hostel.
Police said: “Investigations have then revealed that a man matching the description of the suspect had attempted to gain entry to a supported-living complex in Mapperley Road but had been denied entry. This incident was not reported to the police at the time.”
The hostel was close to the junction of Mapperley Road and Magdala Road, and it is on Magdala Road where Ian Coates’s body was found in the street.
“Police believe the suspect has then attacked a man and stolen his van,” Nottinghamshire police said.
The man took Coates’s van and drove to the Milton Street area, allegedly turning it into a weapon to run over three pedestrians, two of whom at least were standing at a bus stop. One witness to this attack said police had pulled up behind the van shortly before.
Shortly after this officers arrested a man.
Police said: “A short while later, police managed to detain the suspect by using a Taser when he abandoned the vehicle and approached officers with a knife.”
Police denied claims that they received calls about the suspect before his rampage of violence began. “There have also been reports that other calls were made to Nottinghamshire police about the suspect before he carried out the attacks in Ilkeston Road. This is not the case.”
