NEARLY 30 Cumbrian police officers have been deliberately spat at or coughed on in the weeks since coronavirus arrived in Carlisle.

Some of the police officers who were targeted have been spat on by suspects or offenders who have claimed that they were infected with Covid-19, effectively using the virus as a weapon.

Some cases have already been dealt with by the courts, with one offender – a woman from Carlisle – being jailed.

The disturbing facts about how some of the county’s criminals are trying to turn the Covid-19 health crisis to their advantage was revealed after The Cumberland News submitted a Freedom of Information request to Cumbria Constabulary.

This confirmed how, since March 3 - the day when Carlisle’s first coronavirus infection was confirmed - the county has seen:

n 27 occasions when police officers were deliberately spat at or coughed on;

n 23 assaults on police officers during ‘lockdown related’ incidents;

n And 73 instances of people flouting the UK’s lockdown movement rules.

Among the recent cases was that of 27-year-old Kathleen Knaggs, from Botcherby, Carlisle, who was drunk and turned violent when police officers were called out to deal with a road accident which they suspected she was involved in.

When the officers tried to breathalyse her, she became abusive, yelling that she had Covid-19, and HIV, before spitting at the two constables. She was jailed for 14 months.

The Constabulary’s figures show that Carlisle was the area in Cumbria with the most breaches of the government’s lockdown restrictions, imposed in a bid to curb the spread of the virus, which by yesterday had killed nearly 40,000 people across the UK.

Chief Superintendent Rob O’Connor said it was never acceptable for emergency workers - whether police officers, paramedics or nurses - to be assaulted or targeted in this way while they were at work, serving their community.

He said: “That should never ever be acceptable, and in recent times legislation has seen the courts take a strong stance on persons involved in assaulting emergency service workers.

“When I look at my officers and staff who serve and protect the communities they live in, I am appalled when they are targeted because of the job they do, but even more so during the current coronavirus outbreak.

“Since the start of March this year there have been 27 occasions where officers have been either spat at or deliberately coughed at by offenders, and on many occasions this has included the threat by the offender that they have the coronavirus.

“This can have a significant psychological impact on the officer, as they are left in the position initially of not knowing whether the virus has been transmitted to them or not.

“It leaves them in an extremely vulnerable position if they have a young family or are caring for others as they risk infecting them.

“The mental anguish this can cause is immeasurable, and if an officer then does show symptoms and has to go into isolation that means the communities of Cumbria see less officers on the front line.

“We are also seeing occasions where offenders are weaponising the threat of the coronavirus.

“They are being spoken to by officers and then make threats telling the officer they have coronavirus and that if the officers goes near them they will spit or deliberately cough in their face.”

“We have worked with partner agencies, and I was really pleased when nationally it was recognised that such disgusting offences should be dealt with robustly, and working with the Crown Prosecution Service we have seen a number of persons charged and placed before the Courts who have quite rightly handed down custodial sentences in some cases.”

Jamie McTear, secretary of the county’s Police Federation branch, representing rank and file officers, said: “There have been suspects using covid as as a weapon, either to try to avoid arrest or to instil fear in the officers involved.

“It’s absolutely disgusting behaviour.”

He said some of the officers targeted have been recent recruits to the force. “They’re just out of training and then to face being spat at and assaulted. It’s unacceptable. You don’t expect to have to deal with that just for doing your job.”

Officers can use ‘spithoods’ on suspects, but they are deployed usually only after the prisoner has began spitting.