A nurse who tried to resuscitate Sheku Bayoh in a Kirkcaldy hospital has told how he attempted to get in her car as she went to work that morning.
Linda Limbert said she recognised the 31-year-old as he was rushed into A&E at the Victoria Hospital.
Prior to his arrival in an ambulance, Mr Bayoh had been tackled by police officers using incapacitating sprays and a baton, before being restrained on the ground.
Ms Limbert told how just half an hour earlier he had left her terrified as he approached her vehicle on Hayfield Road shortly after 7.15am.
Nurse describes ‘flailing’ arms
She told the public inquiry: “He was crossing Hayfield Road. He was on the road, which prevented me from turning left to drive along.
“I stopped my car, more or less on the roundabout, at that point.
“(He had) what I thought was a knife in his hand and he started to approach my car. From what I remember, I think (it was in) his right hand.
“He was almost approaching my car and touching the door handle. He approached the passenger side of my car.
“He never got to the door because I took off – I drove over the mini-roundabout.
“(I was) very frightened.”
Asked by Angela Grahame what Mr Bayoh had been doing prior to her driving off, Ms Limbert said: “It was just like he was charging at my car with his arms flailing about.
“He was frightening and I felt I had to get away, and that’s what I did.”
Sheku Bayoh rushed to hospital
Ms Limbert called 999 before continuing to her work, where the shaken nurse told colleagues what had happened.
Shortly after she started her shift an unconscious Mr Bayoh was brought in by paramedics at 7.45am.
Ms Limbert said that when he was brought into the hospital’s resus Sheku Bayoh was wearing handcuffs, which were removed within “seconds” of arrival.
She said: “I had been allocated to accept the emergency that was coming in from Hayfield Road.
“I don’t know him but I recognised him as the guy that I had just seen in the street.
“He was unresponsive and had on-going CPR from ambulance and police at the scene.
“(I was) involved in the full resus – helping the doctors and taking my turn doing CPR.
“I remember he had handcuffs on. He was handcuffed to the front.
“He had to get them off obviously so we could get access.”
Resuscitation attempt ‘could have broken ribs’
The hearing also referenced Ms Limbert’s original statement to PIRC, which revealed medics had difficulty fitting a “Thumper” machine – a device for giving hands-free CPR – around Mr Bayoh’s chest.
The statement read: “We had some problem to get the Thumper machine around his chest so the manual compressions were continuing in between.
“On the first occasion the Thumper was too low on his chest, on the second occasion the clips weren’t successfully applied so rather than waste time manual CPR would continue.”
Medics were eventually able to deploy the device.
The hearing was also told that the resuscitation attempts could have left injuries, such as broken ribs, on Mr Bayoh’s body.
The inquiry also heard that in the 75 seconds from the first officers arriving on the scene to Mr Bayoh being restrained on the ground officers used three rounds of CS and PAVA spray, batoned Mr Bayoh to the head and body and shoulder-charged him to the ground.
Terror level at ‘severe’
Inspector Steven Stewart, who was in charge of the Bilston Glen control room at the time of the incident, said officers would have carried out a “dynamic risk assessment” on arrival.
He said: “The control room weren’t aware that that activity had taken place on the ground from when they first arrived, because that information wasn’t fed back.
“But there’s obviously been that arrival at the scene, and it appears from what you’ve shown me today that the officers have come into contact with the male almost immediately.”
The inquiry was played a recording of a phone call between Inspector Stewart and a colleague in which they said Sheku Bayoh was in hospital and it “was not looking good”.
The Inquiry was also shown a post from Police Scotland’s intranet warning officers that the terror threat had been raised to severe.
At that point an attack on officers was deemed “highly likely”.
Officers denies race was a factor
But Inspector Stewart said he did not consider the incident to be terror related.
He said: “I was working on the information and intelligence that was available and fed back but there was nothing to suggest that it was a terrorist related incident at all.”
He also denied that Mr Bayoh’s skin colour had affected how he dealt with the incident.
He said: “I run an equality and diversity team in my current role, do I have equality, diversity and inclusion training.
“I review hate crime on a daily basis – it’s about officers and members of the public being aware of prejudices that they might hold.”
The inquiry before Lord Bracadale will continue on Thursday.
