Arrest in Australia over city murder bid

Leslie Cumming was slashed in the face

Leslie Cumming, 62, was stabbed outside his Murrayfield home in January 2006 after being ambushed by a masked man.

Mr Cumming, the then chief accountant of the Law Society of Scotland, had just parked his Jaguar in the garage behind the flats where he lived in Murrayfield Drive and was making his way along a lane to the front of the building when he realised he was being followed.

As he turned he was stabbed and slashed across the face by a man in a dark balaclava.

A heavily bleeding Mr Cumming managed to stagger home to raise the alarm.

Despite a 10,000 reward on offer and a partial DNA profile of the suspected being assembled by police within days of the attack, no-one has ever been arrested for the crime.

However, last night moves were being made in Australia to extradite a man to Scotland. The man was arrested in Sydney and cannot be named for legal reasons.

In earlier interviews, Mr Cumming had suggested that a possible motive for the attack may have been his involvement in rooting out money-laundering and corruption in the Scottish legal profession. He had worked as head of a team of accountants who inspected the books of solicitors across the country.

Mr Cumming had been appointed chief accountant to the Law Society in 1984, but retired after the attack.

Speaking in March 2006, Mr Cumming told how he twice tried to disarm his attacker despite falling to the ground as he was repeatedly attacked.

"I didn't know what to do but I tried to grapple this individual and get inside the swinging blade. We stepped back and forward while I tried to tear off his balaclava and grip his arms.

"Then I lost my balance and fell. In struggling up from the ground, I was struck several times in the back. When I got back to my feet, I attempted to re-engage with the attacker. We had only moved two or three yards from where it had started. As I tried to grapple him again he broke away and I saw him heading back down the lane. At that point I was left alone.

"It was a very short, violent and vicious attack. I have no idea what you should do in such circumstance. I merely reacted.

"I felt no pain at all at the time. But I could see there was a lot of blood and I knew I needed to get help. The last thing I wanted to do was stay there in the dark while I was bleeding."

He added: "I was very calm in the situation. I knew what needed to be done. I didn't go inside the house. I told my wife to call an ambulance because I had been attacked.

"Then I sat on a bench outside."