An ITV drama series looking at the story of killer Raoul Moat is set to premiere this evening, but has already sparked controversy ahead of airing. The Hunt for Raoul Moat will run tonight and tomorrow before a documentary is aired the following night.
Inspector George Gently star Lee Ingleby and former Vera actress Sonya Cassidy star in the dramatised retelling of the events that horrified the country 13 years ago. However, the disputed series has already been heavily criticised with Moat's daughter saying that the drama will force her to relive the awful memories of her father's crimes.
Katelaine Fitzpatrick, 24, has recalled how she was badly bullied after Moat murdered one person and injured two other in the summer of 2010. Speaking of her evil father, she said: "He was a monster. He ruined so many lives and I don't think it will ever stop affecting my life."
One of Moat's victims was police officer David Rathbad, who was blinded after twice being shot in the face. His widow, Katherine has also slammed the ITV series, which sees her late husband, who took his own life in 2012, being portrayed by actor Dan Skinner.
Moat, 37, had been out of Durham Prison for two days when he arrived at the home of his 22-year-old ex-girlfriend Samantha Stobbart in the early hours of July 3, 2010. He had been serving an 18-week prison sentence for assaulting a nine-year-old relative.
Moat, who was a former bouncer and bodybuilder, was a large man at 6ft 3 in and was known for having a bad temper. Over the course of his life, he had three children including his daughter with Stobbart.
The couple split while Moat was in prison and Stobbart claimed that she had entered a relationship with a police officer to keep him away from her.
When he arrived at a house in Birtley where Stobbart was staying, Moat waited outside a window whilst holding a sawn-off shotgun. The killer claimed he could hear Stobbart and her new partner, Chris Brown, mocking him. He shot Brown dead when he came outside to confront him.
Inside the house, Stobbart's mother tried to contact the police , prompting Moat to shoot into the house, hitting Stobbart in the arm and abdomen. Stobbart was later taken to hospital where she received life-saving surgery.
The following day after he called police to warn them about what he was going to do, Moat gunned down Police Constable David Rathband in an unprovoked attack while he sat in his patrol car on a roundabout in East Denton. Moat resented police as he blamed them for his life falling apart and warned he would target any police officer in his wake.
Rathband had previously crossed paths with Moat when he confiscated his van. The victim was rushed to hospital in critical condition and Moat contacted the police to tell him what he had done while refusing to turn himself in.
Speaking of the ITV drama, Rathband's widow said: "We have no intention of watching it, but it still has an impact as it’s on social media, on newsfeed, it’s everywhere again.
"The kids are proud to be their dad’s children, but it can be hard for them because they carry his surname. They both have close circles of friends who are fully aware of what happened."
Moat was on the run from authorities but was spotted in Seaton Delaval as part of an armed robbery before he made his way to Rothbury. Armed vehicles, helicopters, dogs, a Royal Air Force aircraft and 160 armed officers were all brought in to try and track Moat down.
Believed to be a threat to the wider public, on July 9 police warned Rothbury residents to stay inside while they hunted him down as local schools were provided with armed security. Samantha Stobbart's father Paul issued a video appeal asking Moat to hand himself in while Northumbria Police offered a £10k reward to anyone that helped them locate him.
Moat was eventually surrounded by police on the bank of the River Coquet pointing a shotgun to his neck. Several attempts were made to convince Moat to surrender but he fired the gun on his own head and was later pronounced dead in hospital.
An inquest later found that officers had fired two tazer guns at Moat to stop his suicide but it was not confirmed whether this happened before or after he shot himself. An inquest jury officially ruled his death as a suicide. Moat's friends Karl Ness and Qhurum Awan were later convicted for aiding Moat's crims in 2011.
Ness was handed three concurrent life sentences which totalled to a minimum of 40 years in prison for murder, conspiracy to murder and attempted murder. He had been with Moat on the night of Brown's murder and waited outside while he attacked Stobbart.
Awan was given two sentences for conspiracy to murder and attempted murder, totalling at least 20 years in prison. He had driven Moat around in his car while he tracked down police officers to kill which led to the horrific attack on PC Rathband who was left permanently blind.
They both also were given seven years for robbery and Ness was handed five years for a firearm offence as he helped Moat acquire the shotguns he used on his victims. PC Rathband struggled to adjust to his new life as a result of his blindness and took his own life by hanging in February 2012.
He was due to carry the Olympic torch later that summer, which was taken on by his daughter Mia instead in tribute to her late father. Samantha Stobbart survived and recovered from her injuries but has remained traumatised by what happened to her as she opened up about how she too considered suicide after hearing the news of PC Rathband's death.
She revealed to The People in 2012: "I know what happened will haunt me forever, and I’ll never forget it 100 per cent. But now I'm just trying to move on.
"If I start putting myself in the position of a victim then Raoul has won, and I don’t want to let him win any more. I'm going to get through this and not let him hurt me any more."
Samantha's sister Kelly Stobbart, 40 also slammed the drama as she claimed ITV 'doesn't understand the impact' its series will have on the victims.
David Rathband's widow Kath said she doesn't believe anyone will benefit from the programme apart from ITV. She added: If the object is to inform, I don’t think there is anything that could be said that hasn’t been said already.
"Even if there was, I don’t think this is the way to do it. And if it’s going to be sensationalised, I don’t think it should be given that platform."
The Hunt for Raoul Moat is being brought to our screens by World Productions, the same company responsible for the hit BBC drama's Bodyguard, Line of Duty and Vigil.
A synopsis for tonight's opening episode reads: "Samantha Stobbart strikes up a new romance with Christopher Brown, but is increasingly nervous about her abusive ex-partner Raoul Moat, who is about to be released from prison. Possessive and pathologically jealous, Moat becomes incensed when he learns about her new partner and commits a brutal and violent crime upon his release from jail."
It adds: "On the run, Moat has no intention of going quietly and sets his sights on attacking the police force now hunting him."
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