Armed police swoop in early-morning alert (From Free Press Series)

Armed police swoop in early-morning alert

RESIDENTS in a Gwent town were woken in the early hours of yesterday to find their street was the scene of an armed police operation.

A man wielding a knife was arrested after armed police with flashlights swooped on a house in Coed Eva, Cwmbran.

Neighbours Richard and Ceri Atherton saw the man spreadeagled on the ground, surrounded by armed officers, outside a house in Oaksford early today.

"They came charging out of the house with flashlights and guns. They were searching through the undergrowth and fences nearby," said father of four Mr Atherton, 28.

"They were asking about a knife and whether he had a gun."

Police were alerted at 11pm yesterday after receiving reports of a man running around the Neerings, Coed Eva, with a knife, and residents later heard the sound of the police helicopter circling the immediate area.

One resident, who asked not to be named, said she heard shouting from outside her house. Other residents saw police cars and vans and officers patrolling the maze of pathways which make up the Neerings close to Oaksford, where the man was later arrested.

Another resident, who asked not to be named, said: "I've never seen anything like this in all the time I have been living here."

Throughout this morning police officers were at a house in Oaksford. Police were continuing to question a 45-year-old local man over the incident today.