The press has reported that they were swimming, but I cannot confirm or refute that from my own observations.

The people who think of him as “just another idiot” simply display either, a lack of understanding of human society, or a lack of concern about the feelings of others.

The death of a man will always have echoes; be it a girlfriend, a niece or a drinking buddy. There is always someone who will be affected by someone’s death. It is very rare indeed when someone dies and the world doesn’t notice.

Everyone makes bad decisions or choices during their lives. Some lead to worse situations than others, but people’s decisions are their own to make and that needs respecting. Everyone deserves being remembered (preferably for the good-times had with them) though.

If he was living the life he wanted, as you say Anita, then he was probably a lot happier than most.

I am truly amazed at the growing backlash against the police at the scene. The Express & Echo (the local newspaper, for those not from the region) is full of criticism and is giving a fair number of column inches to the rather vocal complaints of two of the “civilian” rescuers.

Some of the comments on the Express & Echo website are absolutely disgusting (http://tinyurl.com/579l5p); by far the worst labels the size of the response from the emergency services as “overkill” and a “waste of tax payers money” (sic). This sort of pointless vitriol isn’t helping anyone.

Ultimately, no-one except the police at the scene knew what police procedure is in this sort of incident, and arm-chair heroes are not best placed to be making judgments on whether they acted appropriately. I suppose this is what the Independent Police Complaints Commission is for, but I am willing to put money on the fact that people will complain if the commission finds that the officers on the scene acted appropriately.

It must be said, I am feeling a lot less guilty today, but I can’t help but entertain a slow trickle of “what if” scenarios. Mostly it is pointless to dwell on this sort of thing; a more useful line of thought is “If I were in a similar situation tomorrow, what would I do differently?”; learn from the events and resolve to act differently if it happens again.

As my work colleague who dived into help said: “Woe-betide the next person that goes for a swim when I am around; they are getting rescued whether they are in trouble or not”.

I stood on the edge of the quay, struggling with myself over whether it was appropriate to do something, and like yourself, did nothing. I kept telling myself that I was not the best person to get involved, am not a particularly strong swimmer or particularly strong physically, the more people in the water the more confusion it could cause etc. And while I think it was extremely brave, heroic and commendable of the men who did chose to jump in and try and help, I dont think that anyone who didnt should feel bad (including the police). While the exact circumstances of the event (for example why the man chose to get in the water in the first place - I have heard people speculate that he was trying to commit suicide, my impression was that he was drunk and made a grave error of judgement when he thought it would be funny to swim in the river) are still not 100% clear to me, it is clear that the man was drunk, causing some minor trouble, and chose to get in the river of his own accord. For anyone to jump in and help him would have meant that they were risking their own lives too. The river is not safe to swim in, and hypothetically if they had reached the man there could have been a struggle. I think people may have reacted differently if the man had fallen in to the river by accident, or if the victim had not been so obviously intoxicated and aggressive.

I completely agree with your last statement though. My anger is directed towards the small-minded people who stood around loudly voicing their opinions on who should have helped, how ‘useless’ the police were etc etc while failing to make any effort to help themselves. I understand why most people there felt it was inappropriate to get in the water, and powerless to help, but I do not understand how they can then shout about how other people failed to assist the man.