First saw him playing for Ipswich youth at Bromley in the FA Youth Cup in 1985. Powerful striker converted from the right wing. Always a shock when ex-players younger than me pass away.
Sad to see that he was supposedly homeless. The guy was a top premier league striker but in his prime before the big money arrived. If he was around today, he'd probably be on 100k a week and set for life.
Maybe if the police didn't have to face 6ft ex pro footballers, off their tits, trying to kick the doors off an 85 year olds house, they wouldn't need tasers.
You're really not helping.
@Chizz, would you be kind enough to field this one?
Maybe if the police didn't have to face 6ft ex pro footballers, off their tits, trying to kick the doors off an 85 year olds house, they wouldn't need tasers.
I also think that Dalian was of that generation who didn't earn mega money and when they retire all they had was their football. You go from being a star loved and adored by thousands every week to someone who people may forget over time. I'm confident things have improved since his days as a player re; education and what footballers can do when they retire, but you can see why players can fall off the rails
I know every case is individual but we lost David Whyte 2 years ago who was at the time also in a bad place
Great player from back when I really enjoyed football
Terrible situation to find himself in and a tragic end
God bless his family and RIP Dalian
And Mehmet is right if people didn't act like they needed to be bought down by taster or shot by any form of gun then they wouldn't
If he was tasered three times like has been suggested then Imo there needs to be a very thorough investigation into the use of taser, surely if it doesn't incapacitate after the first one it's not a great weapon
Always seemed a nice enough fella when I met him back in about 92 when he was at Wednesday. He used to come to a trendy wine bar in Sheffield called the Woodstock Exchange up Ecclesall Road, that some of my mates worked at. He had just bought a Lotus Carlton and it had a TV in. At the time I had a Cavalier and I thought wow. How footballers lives have moved on. RIP to a young bloke.
Very inflammatory headline, which I hope is nonsense.
Have to admit I'm very suspicious of anything trying to blame the OB for stuff like this over here as I think in the main our police handle situations incredibly well in comparison to their counterparts abroad. But no doubt it could be used for spin to flame riots.
Very inflammatory headline, which I hope is nonsense.
Have to admit I'm very suspicious of anything trying to blame the OB for stuff like this over here as I think in the main our police handle situations incredibly well in comparison to their counterparts abroad. But no doubt it could be used for spin to flame riots.
So witness quotes shouldn't be used then. That'll kill the media. I don't know what happened, I wasn' t there but they were. And good as our police might be they have form in this type of incident. With people of all races and creeds. So I won't assume the worst of the police but I won't rule it out either.
A 48-year-old man who died after being tasered by police in Telford, Shropshire, was repeatedly kicked by officers who used the Taser on him “four or five times” after he had been apparently subdued, an eyewitness has alleged.
The man, who has been named by the witness and local media as former Aston Villa footballer Dalian Atkinson, was tasered by two officers outside his family’s house on Meadow Close, Trench, at around 1:30am Monday.
“He was staggering, and as he staggered towards them they opened fire with the taser and he fell to the ground like a lead balloon,” Paula Quinn, who lives opposite, told BuzzFeed News. “I could actually hear him hit the ground and as he hit the ground the two officers just piled in on him and started kicking ten bells out of him.
“That probably went on for a minute or two, it seemed quite long at the time, everything appeared to be happening in slow motion.”
According to Quinn, one of the officers then told his colleague “back off, back off” before they ordered the man to put his hands behind his back. “But I don’t think he was conscious,” she said.
“They reactivated the Taser about four or five times on him while he was on the ground,” she said. “I could see it very clearly, there was absolutely no threat to him whatsoever and I am absolutely shocked.”
Quinn, who said she had a “birds-eye view” of the scene from her third-storey home across the street, said: “I don’t know if he was perhaps inebriated or something but he certainly wasn’t threatening.”
“I can still hear the boots kicking him, I can still hear it. It makes me feel quite sick.”
The case has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission to investigate.
West Mercia police declined to comment on Quinn’s allegations when contacted by BuzzFeed News, and directed all enquiries to the IPCC.
An IPCC spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations, but quoted their earlier statement: “The IPCC is conducting a full and thorough investigation into all of the circumstances surrounding his death including the use of force.”
The statement said its investigators were at the scene gathering information and will supervise the recovery of initial evidence.
John Campion, West Mercia police and crime commissioner, said he was receiving regular updates and that it was an “important part of my role to hold the police to account”. He continued: “I want to be absolutely clear and reassure our communities that I will be doing that fairly and proportionately.”
In an statement on Monday morning, West Mercia police confirmed officers were called to Meadow Close at around 1:30am in response to “concern for the safety of an individual”. They said a man was pronounced dead at 3am.
Neither West Mercia nor the IPCC would confirm the identity of the man who died.
@Big_Bad_World is actually quite a decent contributor imo gents.
Agreed - embarrassing reactions to his comment, which was the horror of speculating. Something we all do on a daily basis.
Yeah, course we do.
At a guess I would speculate that you are called The Organiser because of your fantastic organisational skills. That's a guess. Pure speculation. I don't know you so don't know if that's true.
But if I found out you'd died I wouldn't be jumping on here to say you were probably off your tits or suffering from some sort of mental illness.
Of course that may well end up being the case, but I wouldn't know, wouldn't have any clue and so that sort of comment wouldn't really be right.
That's all im saying. If that embarrasses you then you need to toughen up mate.
A 48-year-old man who died after being tasered by police in Telford, Shropshire, was repeatedly kicked by officers who used the Taser on him “four or five times” after he had been apparently subdued, an eyewitness has alleged.
The man, who has been named by the witness and local media as former Aston Villa footballer Dalian Atkinson, was tasered by two officers outside his family’s house on Meadow Close, Trench, at around 1:30am Monday.
“He was staggering, and as he staggered towards them they opened fire with the taser and he fell to the ground like a lead balloon,” Paula Quinn, who lives opposite, told BuzzFeed News. “I could actually hear him hit the ground and as he hit the ground the two officers just piled in on him and started kicking ten bells out of him.
“That probably went on for a minute or two, it seemed quite long at the time, everything appeared to be happening in slow motion.”
According to Quinn, one of the officers then told his colleague “back off, back off” before they ordered the man to put his hands behind his back. “But I don’t think he was conscious,” she said.
“They reactivated the Taser about four or five times on him while he was on the ground,” she said. “I could see it very clearly, there was absolutely no threat to him whatsoever and I am absolutely shocked.”
Quinn, who said she had a “birds-eye view” of the scene from her third-storey home across the street, said: “I don’t know if he was perhaps inebriated or something but he certainly wasn’t threatening.”
“I can still hear the boots kicking him, I can still hear it. It makes me feel quite sick.”
The case has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission to investigate.
West Mercia police declined to comment on Quinn’s allegations when contacted by BuzzFeed News, and directed all enquiries to the IPCC.
An IPCC spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations, but quoted their earlier statement: “The IPCC is conducting a full and thorough investigation into all of the circumstances surrounding his death including the use of force.”
The statement said its investigators were at the scene gathering information and will supervise the recovery of initial evidence.
John Campion, West Mercia police and crime commissioner, said he was receiving regular updates and that it was an “important part of my role to hold the police to account”. He continued: “I want to be absolutely clear and reassure our communities that I will be doing that fairly and proportionately.”
In an statement on Monday morning, West Mercia police confirmed officers were called to Meadow Close at around 1:30am in response to “concern for the safety of an individual”. They said a man was pronounced dead at 3am.
Neither West Mercia nor the IPCC would confirm the identity of the man who died.
I'm sorry if this comes across as insensitive and maybe petulant, it's not intended to be, but you all have no idea how lucky you are that this is the immediate reaction to death at the hands of a police officer, and just how rare these deaths are. This is police investigating their own, which may not be ideal, but just to have the notion of "someone has died, we are going to do everything we can to investigate that death" is such light years away from where we are in the States, policing wise.
I do encourage challenging your civic institutions, be they police, civil servants, etc. And I know there is some form here. But it seems to me, as an outsider, you start from a far better position than most when it comes to policing (this from following UK news closely, as well as having lived in the UK).
RIP to Mr. Atkinson. I hope this was a freak accident potentially caused by unique side effects (him being on dialysis), rather than excessive use of force.
The woman witness, BTW, was middle-aged. If you wanted to pigeon-hole her, you'd say typical Tory voter. Not someone you'd automatically assume was anti-police. It's difficult to imagine why she'd make this stuff up. Still, if true, it would be fairly straightforward for the forensics to support her testimony. I'm guessing there are some very worried BiB.
@Big_Bad_World is actually quite a decent contributor imo gents.
Agreed - embarrassing reactions to his comment, which was the horror of speculating. Something we all do on a daily basis.
Yeah, course we do.
At a guess I would speculate that you are called The Organiser because of your fantastic organisational skills. That's a guess. Pure speculation. I don't know you so don't know if that's true.
But if I found out you'd died I wouldn't be jumping on here to say you were probably off your tits or suffering from some sort of mental illness.
Of course that may well end up being the case, but I wouldn't know, wouldn't have any clue and so that sort of comment wouldn't really be right.
That's all im saying. If that embarrasses you then you need to toughen up mate.
I know where you're coming from but I'm not famous. When famous people die, in unusual circumstances, speculations, rumours and conspiracies run wild - it's just the way it is and I had already read what the Millwall lad had written from several other sources today.
Just thought he was jumped on a bit quickly and harshly for doing what many others are and will do and it was with more spite to it (not aimed at you off-it) cos he's Millwall. I detest Millwall as much as anyone but it's clear to me he is a good lad and worthwhile contributor to the site and it would be a shame to lose people like that.
Cheers.
PS my organising skills are not what they were as anyone who remembers my French hotel cock-up in the summer would remind me.
The woman witness, BTW, was middle-aged. If you wanted to pigeon-hole her, you'd say typical Tory voter. Not someone you'd automatically assume was anti-police. It's difficult to imagine why she'd make this stuff up. Still, if true, it would be fairly straightforward for the forensics to support her testimony. I'm guessing there are some very worried BiB.
Just seen her interview - "an African gentleman" classic.
I'm gonna stick my neck on the line and say I think he's more likely to be of Caribbean descent than African, but why couldn't she just say 'black'. She's come across as very pigeon holed based on that interview....
Comments
@Chizz, would you be kind enough to field this one?
Ridiculous goal
I know every case is individual but we lost David Whyte 2 years ago who was at the time also in a bad place
Terrible situation to find himself in and a tragic end
God bless his family and RIP Dalian
And Mehmet is right if people didn't act like they needed to be bought down by taster or shot by any form of gun then they wouldn't
If he was tasered three times like has been suggested then Imo there needs to be a very thorough investigation into the use of taser, surely if it doesn't incapacitate after the first one it's not a great weapon
RIP to a young bloke.
Have to admit I'm very suspicious of anything trying to blame the OB for stuff like this over here as I think in the main our police handle situations incredibly well in comparison to their counterparts abroad. But no doubt it could be used for spin to flame riots.
an unnecessary death
I don't know what happened, I wasn' t there but they were. And good as our police might be they have form in this type of incident. With people of all races and creeds. So I won't assume the worst of the police but I won't rule it out either.
The man, who has been named by the witness and local media as former Aston Villa footballer Dalian Atkinson, was tasered by two officers outside his family’s house on Meadow Close, Trench, at around 1:30am Monday.
“He was staggering, and as he staggered towards them they opened fire with the taser and he fell to the ground like a lead balloon,” Paula Quinn, who lives opposite, told BuzzFeed News. “I could actually hear him hit the ground and as he hit the ground the two officers just piled in on him and started kicking ten bells out of him.
“That probably went on for a minute or two, it seemed quite long at the time, everything appeared to be happening in slow motion.”
According to Quinn, one of the officers then told his colleague “back off, back off” before they ordered the man to put his hands behind his back. “But I don’t think he was conscious,” she said.
“They reactivated the Taser about four or five times on him while he was on the ground,” she said. “I could see it very clearly, there was absolutely no threat to him whatsoever and I am absolutely shocked.”
Quinn, who said she had a “birds-eye view” of the scene from her third-storey home across the street, said: “I don’t know if he was perhaps inebriated or something but he certainly wasn’t threatening.”
“I can still hear the boots kicking him, I can still hear it. It makes me feel quite sick.”
The case has been referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission to investigate.
West Mercia police declined to comment on Quinn’s allegations when contacted by BuzzFeed News, and directed all enquiries to the IPCC.
An IPCC spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations, but quoted their earlier statement: “The IPCC is conducting a full and thorough investigation into all of the circumstances surrounding his death including the use of force.”
The statement said its investigators were at the scene gathering information and will supervise the recovery of initial evidence.
John Campion, West Mercia police and crime commissioner, said he was receiving regular updates and that it was an “important part of my role to hold the police to account”. He continued: “I want to be absolutely clear and reassure our communities that I will be doing that fairly and proportionately.”
In an statement on Monday morning, West Mercia police confirmed officers were called to Meadow Close at around 1:30am in response to “concern for the safety of an individual”. They said a man was pronounced dead at 3am.
Neither West Mercia nor the IPCC would confirm the identity of the man who died.
Twat
Rip dalian ...you were always loved up here .
At a guess I would speculate that you are called The Organiser because of your fantastic organisational skills. That's a guess. Pure speculation. I don't know you so don't know if that's true.
But if I found out you'd died I wouldn't be jumping on here to say you were probably off your tits or suffering from some sort of mental illness.
Of course that may well end up being the case, but I wouldn't know, wouldn't have any clue and so that sort of comment wouldn't really be right.
That's all im saying. If that embarrasses you then you need to toughen up mate.
I do encourage challenging your civic institutions, be they police, civil servants, etc. And I know there is some form here. But it seems to me, as an outsider, you start from a far better position than most when it comes to policing (this from following UK news closely, as well as having lived in the UK).
RIP to Mr. Atkinson. I hope this was a freak accident potentially caused by unique side effects (him being on dialysis), rather than excessive use of force.
I'm guessing there are some very worried BiB.
Just thought he was jumped on a bit quickly and harshly for doing what many others are and will do and it was with more spite to it (not aimed at you off-it) cos he's Millwall. I detest Millwall as much as anyone but it's clear to me he is a good lad and worthwhile contributor to the site and it would be a shame to lose people like that.
Cheers.
PS my organising skills are not what they were as anyone who remembers my French hotel cock-up in the summer would remind me.
RIP Dalian.
RIP that's it RIP
I'm gonna stick my neck on the line and say I think he's more likely to be of Caribbean descent than African, but why couldn't she just say 'black'. She's come across as very pigeon holed based on that interview....
Very sad.
Sad sad story.
Decent footballer. Whatever happened after the football will come out I'm sure. As will the reason you were tasered.
Can we remind everybody that the police would have only brought out the taser if they felt threatened.
Body cam should have been being worn so once again truth will come out.