The police hunting suspected gunman Raoul Moat said the net was closing in on him as officers imposed an exclusion zone around the village of Rothbury in Northumberland.
They earlier announced they had found two men who they say may have been taken hostage by Moat. Both have now been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to murder. Detective chief superintendent Neil Adamson, leading the search for the 37-year-old body-builder, said the two men were found, unhurt, walking alongside a road near Rothbury.
Armed police was called to an area of Rothbury after a black Lexus car believed to have been driven by Moat was found. Earlier, the police intensified its search for Moat after shootings in Gateshead and Newcastle at the weekend. A 49-page hand-written letter, purportedly by Moat, to the Northumbria police and published by the Sun newspaper on Tuesday suggested he was pursuing a vendetta against the force. “Last night I called 999 and declared war on Northumbria police before shooting an officer on the West End A69 roundabout in his T5 (patrol car),” the letter said. “The public need not fear me but the police should as I won’t stop till I’m dead.”
The Northumbria police, which is leading the manhunt, would not confirm the letter was from Moat. Moat is suspected of shooting his former girlfriend, Samantha Stobbart, 22, and killing her boyfriend, Chris Brown, 20, early on Saturday morning at her mother’s home in Gateshead, shortly after he was released from the jail.
He then allegedly shot and critically injured P.C. David Rathband, 42, as he sat in a patrol car a few miles away at East Denton, Newcastle. In the letter, Moat blamed police for wrecking his life and destroying his relationship with Stobbart. “I’m not on the run, I will keep killing police until I am dead,” the letter said. “They’ve hunted me for years, now it’s my turn.”