“… I can’t sit around in lockdown.”
A fugitive armed robber was arrested after popping out to buy the latest Call of Duty.
West Midlands Police published the video, below, showing 36-year-old Clint Butler kicking one officer in the groin before being restrained.
Butler said he ventured into town – breaking lockdown rules in the process – to buy Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. He told officers: “I’ve come to get the new Call of Duty because I can’t sit around in lockdown.”
After an officer asked to check Butler’s details, the fugitive kicked him and tried to run off. Officers used incapacitant spray in order to restrain him.
It turns out Butler was an armed robber on the run from prison. He gave a false name before finally admitting who he was and that he’d absconded from HMP Spring Hill open prison in Buckinghamshire. He’d been serving a 17-year extended sentence for crimes including robbery and firearms offences, which is due to finish in 2024.
But he fled the prison at around midnight on 28th November 2020, and was issued as wanted by Thames Valley Police who urged the public not to approach him if they saw him.
Butler, it seems, was so desperate to play Call of Duty that he risked being spotted by the police. Could he have not just downloaded it instead?
Eurogamer news cast: all about the Nintendo Switch Pro.
The incident occurred on 13th January this year after officers saw Butler and a friend change direction as they spotting them in Birmingham city centre.
He was jailed for 13 months for absconding from prison, and six months consecutively for assaulting the officers.
“Quite why he decided to risk being returned to prison by making the idiotic decision to come into town during lockdown with a friend to buy a video game will remain a bit of a mystery,” Supt Nick Rowe commented.
