TRIBUTE AT LAST TO FALLEN OFFICER

26-06-2008

Fallen West Midlands police officer DC Mick Swindells will finally receive a memorial after a long-running campaign by Stirrer editor Adrian Goldberg to get his sacrifice recognised.

Mick was posthumously awarded the Queen’s Gallantry Medal after being fatally stabbed in May 2004 on a canal towpath close to Spaghetti Junction by paranoid schizophrenic Earl Glaister Butler.

Despite that, there is no local memorial to him – an issue first raised on this website in January 2007 (see link here).

Goldberg then wrote an open letter via his weekly Birmingham Mail column to movie director Michael Winner who runs the Police Memorial Trust which honours those who have died in the line of duty.

Winner responded from his sickbed in February 2007 with a promise that Mick would not be forgotten - it was all a question of getting the funding in place.

He’s been as good as his word because next Monday, a memorial will be unveiled at a ceremony attended Mick’s widow and daughter. Winner will also be there.

Former Police Federation chair Paul Tonk’s paid tribute to his former colleague’s bravery, saying “His actions epitomised what sort of man he was. He was fully aware of the dangers. He knew there was a madman on the street with a knife.”

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