Armed officers, a dog team and drones were scrambled to search for a man after footage revealed him chasing another man down a street armed with a machete.
Nottinghamshire Police was alerted by council CCTV operators after a man was witnessed banging his head on shop shutters in Outram Street, Sutton-in-Ashfield, just before 2am this morning.
Control room staff located the incident on CCTV and subsequent playback showed him chasing another man with a machete type weapon, down St Michael’s Street, before going out of view.
Officers swung into action to search the area, locating three men with injuries, two of which had minor inuries and a third who had suffered a gash to the back of his head and was taken to hospital. The force’s armed response unit and dog teams were dispatched to the area along with the force’s drone team.
Following further intelligence into the force the man was eventually located asleep in bloodstained clothing inside a property on St Michaels Street. A large machete weapon was recovered from the scene.
Two men were arrested on suspicion of affray, assault and possession of offensive weapons.
Sergeant Jamie Bower said: “Reports of people with weapons on our streets are taken extremely seriously and can be distressing for members of the public who witness it.
“Our enquiries are ongoing but we believe this incident involved three people who are known to each other and there is no threat to the wider public.
“This incident highlights that offenders never know when they are being watched and I’d like to thank our colleagues at the CCTV team for contacting us about it.
“It meant that we were instantly on scene and were able to use specialist teams to locate the suspects whilst also seizing a weapon.
“As a force we have been working proactively with our partners to drive down violence and weapon-related offences on our streets.”
A recent report by the Office for National Statistics has revealed a significant drop in these type of offences with violence with injury crimes falling by 25 per cent and knife crime falling by 15 per cent over the last year.
