By CASEY NEILL
POLICE convinced a knife-wielding Noble Park man who was threatening himself, bystanders and officers to drop his weapons on 12 August last year.
Their exceptional performance during a dangerous and volatile incident earned those involved Divisional Commendations at last week’s Southern Metro Region Division 3 honours and awards ceremony at Cardinia Cultural Centre.
Acting Senior Sergeant Colin Huth was among the 13 officers who responded to reports of a man running through Nockolds Crescent, trying to attack someone with a knife.
“It was a mentally affected male who had taken some form of drugs,” he said.
“When we got there, we received some information that the male had barricaded himself in the house.”
They locked down the surrounding area and ushered nearby residents to safety.
“About five minutes later he started smashing his way out of the house, armed with various knives and implements, started throwing knives at police members,” Act Sen Sgt Huth said.
“He jumped up on a car and started smashing the car, then he started running.
“We had various members with firearms out.”
He said officers negotiated with the man and tried to calm him down to “get some sort of resolution without anyone getting hurt”.
“We were able to contain him over a period of 10 minutes, with him running at us and charging with the knives,” he said.
“He managed to run down a side street, we still contained him and continued to negotiate until eventually he dropped those knives.
“We successfully apprehended him without anyone else getting hurt – without him getting hurt, without us getting hurt, so we had a good resolution.”
Act Sen Sgt Huth said the incident lasted about 15 minutes.
“The engagement part of the incident with him was only between eight and 10, so it was pretty quick, pretty dynamic,” he said.
“Unfortunately on that particular day we asked for all of those additional support services that we would normally request, like the dog squad, and air wing, and they were either too far away or not working at that time so we were left to deal with the situation.
“Fortunately we had a great bunch of guys who applied themselves extremely well under tough circumstances and came through.
“They’re a great bunch. I’m very happy to see them rewarded for their work.”
The team included Springvale’s Senior Constable James Frost, Constables Jon Weisshardt and Andrew Cox and First Constable Adrian Walter, and Dandenong’s Constable Jerome Ithier.
Alongside them were Cranbourne Constable Nicholas Walters, Darebin CIU Senior Constable Richard Evans and Constable Matthew Toohey, Transit South 1 Constables Warren Frost and Wesley Yarnton and Operations Response Unit Constables Daniel Justice and Madeleine Robertson.
