Gunman brother 'was no psycho'

Angus Moat is convinced he could have prevented his younger brother's death but said police would not let him intervene during the tense six-hour stand-off which ended with a fatal gunshot at 1.15am on Saturday.

The tax officer, 39, said his brother was a sensitive person who may have been suffering a breakdown when he shot his former girlfriend, killed her new boyfriend and then turned his gun on a police officer.

After being cornered on a riverbank in Rothbury, Northumberland – following a seven-day manhunt – Moat, 37, told police that nobody cared about him.

Mr Moat, of Newcastle, had not seen his brother for several years but immediately contacted police and offered to talk to him, only to be told it could make the situation "more volatile".

"He was just sitting there in the open, in no cover, crying about the fact he had no family and no dad and that nobody loved him," he said. That was not true.

"He had loads of people but died believing he had none."

Mr Moat questioned why two electronic stun guns were used in the effort to bring Moat down and asked why no marks from the Tasers were mentioned in the post-mortem examination report, which gave his cause of death as a gunshot wound to the head.

He suggested the shock from the stun gun may have caused Moat to pull the trigger on the shotgun that he had been holding to his head throughout the stand-off. Mr Moat said: "I'm thinking – you discharge a Taser on a man who is soaked to the skin, in a rainstorm, who has got a gun pointed at his head, with his finger on the trigger?

"He's going to have an involuntary reaction and pull the trigger, and he's going to die and he might not necessarily have ever wanted to."

The manhunt was sparked on July 3 after Moat's former girlfriend Sam Stobbart, 22, was shot and her 29-year-old boyfriend Chris Brown killed in Gateshead.

The next morning Pc David Rathband, 42, was shot in an unprovoked attack at a roundabout in Newcastle.

Mr Moat said: "What he did was totally wrong, totally monstrous and I am not trying to defend or excuse it.

"Raoul has been made out to be some kind of Terminator, Rambo character, a psycho, and it could not be more untrue."

He said his brother was "perhaps too sensitive" and may have longed for a stable family unit because of a "fairly dysfunctional background with very little maternal affection".

The breakdown of his relationship with Miss Stobbart may have been "the straw that broke the camel's back", he said.

Mr Moat's comments echoed those of his uncle Charlie Alexander who said that he had also offered to join negotiations and had been rebuffed by police.

Mr Alexander said he also believes Moat may have surrendered if he realised family members still loved him.

Staff from the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), which is investigating events leading up to Moat's death, visited his family yesterday.

The probe will look into why officers used Tasers on Moat during the stand-off and consider whether Northumbria Police took adequate action following a warning from Durham Prison that Moat might intend to harm Miss Stobbart following his release on July 1.

Police were carrying out searches in and around Rothbury after it was suggested Moat may have left behind a second weapon.

Cragside House, the National Trust stately home nearby, remained closed to the public.