Nottinghamshire Police left suspect at large 10 months before killings

Nottinghamshire Police failed to execute a warrant for Valdo Calocane for 10 months, leaving him at liberty before he fatally stabbed three people and seriously injured three others in Nottingham on 13 June 2023. The lapse emerged on the second day of a judge-led public inquiry sitting at Mary Ward House in London, where lawyers pressed police and health services over decisions made before the attacks.

Calocane killed University of Nottingham students Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley‑Kumar, both 19, and caretaker Ian Coates, 65. He also seriously injured three other people and, according to inquiry submissions, attempted to kill three more. Counsel for the families told the inquiry the outstanding warrant had been issued in September 2022 at Nottingham Magistrates’ Court after Calocane failed to attend a hearing related to an allegation he assaulted an emergency worker, and remained unexecuted until the June attacks.

Tim Moloney KC, representing the relatives of Webber, O’Malley‑Kumar and Coates, told the inquiry: “That warrant was outstanding for 10 months, and Nottinghamshire Police did not execute it for 10 months. They just left him out on the streets.” He added that any suggestion arresting Calocane would not have made a difference would be “cowardly, highly offensive and insulting.”

Counsel raised further concerns about policing contacts in the months before the killings. About a month prior to the attacks, Calocane is reported to have assaulted two colleagues at a factory in Kegworth, Leicestershire; Leicestershire Police did not arrest him for that incident. The inquiry will seek to establish why those opportunities to intervene were not pursued and whether different choices could have prevented the fatalities.

Rob Griffin, the temporary deputy chief constable, described the failure to execute the warrant as “a serious, systemic, operational failure on the part of Nottinghamshire Police,” Mr Beggs told the inquiry, relaying Griffin’s words. “He recognised the seriousness of what happened, or rather, what didn’t happen, and the distress it caused. He offered, and we repeat, an unreserved apology to the families of the deceased and the survivors,” Mr Beggs added.

The inquiry has been told Calocane had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and was known to local mental health services. Counsel asked the chairwoman to consider whether prosecution, conviction and imprisonment would have been realistic during the period when he was unwell, or whether police and health services should have handled risk differently.

Opening submissions set the scope of questioning for police officers and NHS mental health workers. As Langdale explained to the hearing, the inquiry will examine: “What did they do? Was it enough? What should they have done?” Hearings are scheduled to run for nine weeks and will probe the sequence of contacts, decision-making, and whether existing procedures and legal powers were applied appropriately.

The families’ counsel framed the case as one about preventable failure rather than inevitable tragedy, while police representatives acknowledged shortcomings and offered apology through intermediaries. The inquiry now faces the task of reconciling clinical realities, policing practice and legal options in order to recommend changes that could reduce the risk of a repeat failure.