Helen Archer | On 02, May 2023

To many, Raoul Moat has become a punchline, his extremely public “manhunt” something people look back on with a sense of detached irony, a disbelief – almost – that it happened. A farce. For seven days in July 2010, a nation seemed glued to the rolling news of a man who was on the run from police in Tyne and Wear, after fatally shooting his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend and wounding his ex. Things came to a head on 9th July, after TV survivalist Ray Mears had consulted with police on Moat’s whereabouts, and Paul Gascoigne arrived at the cordons – beyond which Moat was attempting a suicide-by-cop – wearing a dressing gown and bearing some chicken, four cans of lager, and a fishing rod. You couldn’t, as they say, make it up.

Behind the story, though, was a real human tragedy, one that was immediately, and permanently, overshadowed by the media hoop-la of it all. The first episode of this three-part dramatisation, directed by Gareth Bryn and written by Kevin Sampson, gives life and voice to those affected, while also depicting, briskly yet powerfully, the dynamics of an abusive, coercive relationship.

Moat was 31 when he met 15-year-old Samantha Stobbart in 2004, and as the series begins, he is looking forward to his release from prison, having been jailed for 18 weeks for assaulting 9-year-old daughter. On finding out Samantha has begun a new relationship, he begins bombarding her with phone calls, arranging for associates to find out who she was seeing – all witnessed by prison guards, who warned superiors that Moat shouldn’t be released. Sally Messham conveys Samantha’s fear and dread with precision, so that there is no doubt in the viewer’s mind that, when she fatefully told Moat her new boyfriend was a police officer, it is out of a desperation, a last-ditch attempt to get Moat to leave her alone. As Christopher Brown, the karate instructor who falls for Samantha, Josef Davies emanates warmth, strength, and kindness – giving Christopher a roundness of character, so that when Moat (Matt Stokoe) ambushes and executes him, it packs a real emotional punch.

The next two episodes, however, are less compelling. While initially fairly lackadaisical about the fact that an active shooter was still armed and on the run – the murder was thought to be “domestic”, with no danger to the wider public – the force quickly changed tack when Moat “declared war” on the police themselves. After shooting PC David Rathband at point-blank range – he survived, but lost his sight, and died by suicide two years later – the police stepped up their search, fearing for their own.

What follows is an inept manhunt, and small glances into the press and public’s reaction to the unfolding events. Local journalist Diane Barnwell (Sonya Cassidy) – a character created for the dramatisation, and written here as the obvious “voice of reason” – is astonished to find a facebook page titled Raoul Moat You Legend, in which people are lionising the killer. Detective Chief Superintendent Neil Adamson (Lee Ingleby) leaves a pub in disgust when chanting begins – “Raoul Moat is our mate, he kills coppers” – while also firefighting the information released by superiors that Moat’s prison recall notice had been missed by the authorities because it arrived in their inbox on a Friday afternoon, as the office was closing.

Moat’s two accomplices are brought in to be interviewed, expressing no remorse that the gun they had obtained for him was used to kill Brown. In between all this, Brown’s mother Sally (Angela Bain) and sister Beckie (Sophie Wise) are shown in short scenes as they complain that no information has been passed to them, baffled and horrified by Moat’s elevation to local hero.

By the time of Christopher’s inquest, press interest in Moat had died down, so that, according to this dramatisation, only one local journalist turned up. The Hunt for Raoul Moat does well to redress that balance, to remind us of the human story and the misery he caused and left behind – but it does little to contextualise the events of July 2010 into something which says anything meaningful about the distrust of police, the lack of concern for incidents deemed domestic, or even the way in which the rolling news and social media desensitises us to the real lives on display, open to public consumption. It does, at least, once and for all, puncture any remaining notion that Moat was anything other than a coward, a bully, and a quintessential abuser.

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