Michael Swindells QGM

Circumstances

DC Swindells was stabbed once in the chest, penetrating his heart, while pursuing a suspect, known to be armed with a kitchen knife, on a towpath of the Tame Valley Canal underneath Gravelly Hill Interchange in Aston, Birmingham. The suspect had used the knife earlier in the day to threaten a carpenter carrying out routine repair work on a garden gate outside his council house, which led to DC Swindells and some of his colleagues later encountering the suspect on a park bench then pursuing him down the towpath for over half-a-mile.

Posthumously awarded the Queen's Gallantry Medal.