Cop killer Dale Cregan taken from jail to hospital with heavy police presence
Dale Cregan, who killed two female police officers, was taken to Aintree University Hospital on Merseyside from prison on December 1 with a reportedly heavy police presence
Cop killer Dale Cregan, who killed two female police officers, was transferred from prison to hospital in a high-security operation that saw a heavy police presence deployed in the dead of night.
Images show officers outside Aintree University Hospital on Merseyside after he was taken there for an apparently pre-arranged appointment on Monday (December 1).
Cregan was jailed for life for the murders of David Short, 46, and son Mark, 23, in a grenade attack and of policewomen Nicola Hughes, 23, and Fiona Bone, 32, in horrifying gun violence in 2012, reports the MEN.
In a statement Merseyside Police said: “We can confirm Merseyside Police were present at Aintree Hospital on Monday December 1, providing support whilst a patient received medical support. There is no longer a police presence at the hospital.”
The Ministry of Justice said it could not comment.
Cregan was admitted to Manchester Eye Hospital under armed guard a few years ago due to an apparent growth on his remaining eye. It is not clear if the appointment at Aintree was for the same reason. Cregan claimed he lost his left eye during a fight on a trip to Thailand.
In 2013, the Manchester Evening News revealed that Cregan had a £20,000 bounty placed on his remaining good eye by a rival criminal gang. The imprisoned head of a crime family in south England was said to have put out the contract.
The rival gang leader was said to be sympathetic to the Shorts and made the contract payable on the destruction of Cregan’s good right eye in prison.
Cregan, then a fugitive having murdered the Shorts, two gangland rivals, lured police to a house with a false report of a burglary. He killed PCs Nicola from Saddleworth, and Fiona. from Sale, in cold-blood as they approached the door of a house in Mottram-in Longdendale, Tameside, where he had been hiding.
In an act of extreme violence on the morning of September 18, 2012, Cregan fired 32 shots he fired from his Glock – with its extended magazine.
As he opened the front door to the maisonette in Abbey Gardens, to confront the approaching officers, he blasted them both in the chest. The only reason they didn’t die immediately was because they were wearing body armour.
Both made a run for it. PC Bone tried to dart to the side across the front garden while PC Hughes turned back up the path as more shots were fired at them.
A shot to PC Hughes’ back severed her spinal cord and she collapsed paralysed onto the ground. She was shot three more times either as she fell, or while laying face down on the path.
Cregan then fired another 24 shots at PC Bone with some missing. The brave officer fought back and managed to draw her Taser stun gun.
She pulled the trigger but hit the pavement rather than Cregan. In all she suffered eight gunshot wounds. One of those bullets penetrated a gap in the side of the body armour under her arm and caused fatal injuries to her heart.
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