@c5news: “I can still hear myself screaming. I can hear the fear and desperation in my own voice as I shouted at him to get off and stop. I never thought I would hear myself like that.” Two policewomen “feared for their lives” after they were beaten and strangled after responding to reports a man had smashed a window and damaged his hotel room. Bodycam footage shows the officers knocking on a door of hotel room in Capel St Mary, Ipswich, on 29 July. Xander Butler then “rushed at one of the officers, throwing her into a wall and placing an arm around her neck,” Suffolk Constabulary said. When the other officer tried to intervene and help her colleague, the force said Butler, 23, grabbed her from behind, “wrapping an arm around her neck, restricting her breathing, before punching her to the face”. The officer said she was struck between four and five times. Now free, the first officer to be attacked, drew her Taser and discharged it after Butler “failed to comply with her instructions”. He was then detained and arrested. One officer suffered facial swelling, bruising, jaw pain and a head injury, requiring hospital assessment and X-rays. The other cut her arm and suffered general soreness. In her victim impact statement for the court, one of the officers described feeling “helpless” and “terrified”. “I genuinely feared for my life. As the attack unfolded, my thoughts immediately turned to my family and loved ones. I thought about the possibility that I might never see them again and the devastating impact that would have on those I could have left behind. No one should go to work believing there is a chance they may not come home at the end of their shift.” The officer said she had “vivid and violent nightmares” that night which have continued ever since. Her colleague said: “I genuinely believed he was not going to stop. I remember thinking that if me and my colleague could not find a way to stop him, he could seriously hurt or even kill one of us. “That fear, and not knowing how far it was going to go, has stayed with me. One of the things I struggle with most is that I can still hear myself screaming. I can hear the fear and desperation in my own voice as I shouted at him to get off and stop. I never thought I would hear myself like that.” Sergeant Alasdair Nicol, South West Response team “This was one of the worst assaults on police officers I have seen.” Earlier this month, Butler was jailed for 16 months having admitted intentional strangulation, assault by beating of an emergency worker and criminal damage. A further count of both intentional strangulation and of assault by beating of an emergency worker were left on file after Butler pleaded not guilty to these offences.

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Tuesday 06 October 2026 15:04:58 GMT