Officer pulled drunken man out of path of HGVs on busy dual carriageway

10 November 2021

A Suffolk police constable who pulled a drunken man to safety after he ran out onto a busy dual carriageway has been nominated for a bravery award.

PC Chris Clark showed “cool-headed professionalism” as he dragged the man to the relative safety of the hard shoulder on the A14 before a scuffle ensued.

PC Clark then managed to restrain the man for nearly 11 minutes within feet of the busy road until back-up arrived.

He has now been nominated in the Police Federation’s Police Bravery Awards 2021.

PC Clark was called out to a report of a broken-down vehicle on the A14 - which links Felixstowe, Britain’s largest container port, with the Midlands and is heavily used by HGVs - shortly before 9pm on 19 June 2020.

On arrival, PC Clark pulled up behind the vehicle which was parked on the hard shoulder. The intoxicated man was also on the hard shoulder, and sat on his vehicle’s bonnet as PC Clark started to carry out checks.

The man then glanced towards the dual carriageway before running onto it.

PC Clark also entered the lanes of traffic and managed to pull him back onto the hard shoulder only for the man to resist, trying to overpower the officer.

Both nearly ended up on the road as heavy traffic roared past, before the officer managed to restrain him until other officers came to his assistance.

Darren Harris, the Suffolk Police Federation chair, said: “Having studied PC Clark’s body-worn video footage, I can only describe this incident as horrific.

“With little concern for his own personal safety, PC Clark made sure this man was kept from harm until his colleagues were on the scene.

“It must have seemed like an eternity but he showed cool-headed professionalism throughout an extremely stressful situation and has rightly been commended for his actions.”

PC Clark, based at Force Headquarters in Martlesham Heath, near Ipswich, has 14 years’ service with the Force. For this incident, he has received a Royal Humane Society Award.

The defendant went to trial and was found guilty of being drunk and disorderly and common assault on an emergency worker.

PC Clark will join other nominees from across England and Wales at the Police Federation of England and Wales Police Bravery Awards ceremony being held in London in December.