Inquiry told of bid to save Moat’s life

Raoul Moat’s half-brother made a desperate attempt to save his life – despite the gunman’s vow to “take the shoot-out” rather than return to jail.

Angus Moat, who has the same mother as Raoul Moat but a different father, told an inquest he pleaded with police to be allowed to speak to his brother on the night he died.

He wanted to tell the former nightclub doorman to surrender for the sake of his children, and that there were people who loved him.

The tax officer, 41, knew Moat had read reports in which his mother had claimed he would be “better off dead” and said he wanted to persuade the fugitive that a life sentence would be “better than death”.

He claimed it was a mistake he was not allowed to intervene beside expert police negotiators.

Mr Moat, who attended the inquest with his father Peter Blake, told the hearing at Newcastle Crown Court: “I’d have told him to think of his kids. Raoul thought everybody in his own family was against him and I wanted to show him that was not the case. I thought if I could speak to him it could change the way he was feeling and the way he would act. Raoul responded to aggression and threat, but he also responded to kindness and friendship.”

Mr Moat said Raoul’s troubled relationship with his “severely mentally ill” mother might have been behind the gunman’s rampage of violence. The gunman may have inherited some of her mental illness, which was “severe bipolar disorder” with psychotic episodes, his half-brother said.

Asked if his brother could have been similarly afflicted, Mr Moat replied: “Most definitely, I think he had an undiagnosed case of bipolar brought on by stress, being in prison, losing his business and his home.”

Mr Moat said his brother suffered physical abuse as a child and that could have pushed him towards bodybuilding and martial arts in adulthood.

Cross-examining for Northumbria Police, John Beggs asked whether Angus Moat’s comments were “born principally of guilt” that he’d had no close contact with his brother for almost eight years. He replied: “Not principally. It is a factor, but not principally.

“I got involved once there was a concrete situation. I saw firearms were involved on both sides. I thought it could potentially be the end of my brother’s life and I did not want that to happen. I knew he would be in a lot of trouble, but I did not want him to die. My view was that going to prison for the rest of his life would be better than death.”

The inquest heard Moat recorded a message before he was cornered by police marksmen saying he would “take the shoot-out” rather than go back to jail.

In the message, he described losing the only two people who mattered to him – his grandmother and his former girlfriend, Samantha Stobbart.

He said: “If I went to jail now, I could hack it because I have lost everything and I have nothing to come out to. I have come out and got my vengeance. I have set Sam up for life, financially at least. But it is not really what I want. It would be a waste of a life and a waste of the taxpayer’s money. Just take the shoot-out and everybody’s happy.”

Superintendent Jim Napier, the Northumbria Police officer in charge of the criminal investigation into Moat’s rampage, said the message had affected the way in which the stand-off was handled. It is a personal disappointment I never got to see Mr Moat account for his crimes,” he told the hearing.

The inquest continues.