'Lock your doors... everyone lock your doors!' The chilling cry from police to ... trends now
The commuters were on their way to the Tube and family homes were buzzing with activity, getting ready for school.
But the Tuesday morning routine of the residents of the quiet north-east London neighbourhood of Hainault was suddenly shattered by the sound of a speeding van slamming into the side of a house.
Moments later, ear-piercing screams would reverberate around a suburban close as a boy of 14 in his tracksuit was struck down in a vicious and unprovoked sword attack.
It was part of a terrifyingly violent and bloody rampage that would leave the boy dead and four others, including two police officers, seriously wounded.
Exactly what happened – and why – is what the police were still trying to piece together last night, unable to question their suspect while he receives hospital treatment. But witnesses said that at around 6.50am a grey Ford Transit van with its bumper hanging off stopped in the middle of a cul-de-sac on Laing Close.
Police were scrambled to the scene following reports that a car had driven into a property
A man 'wielding a machete' was seen 'prowling the streets of east London'
Neighbours cautiously opened their front doors and peered out of garden windows after a man let himself out of the crumpled and smoking van, holding a mobile phone and asking onlookers where he was. Confusion quickly turned to terror as the man withdrew a samurai-style sword from the back of his trousers and began stalking the streets.
The schoolboy victim, understood to be the son of two teachers, stood no chance, witnesses said. Just yards from his front door, he was cut down as a neighbour screamed to warn him.
The teenager died later in hospital but one onlooker said the attack was so vicious he had believed he died 'on the spot'.
As the victim lay fatally wounded on the corner of Laing Close, his killer dragged him from the road towards the pavement before he began prowling through front gardens, wielding his weapon as if hunting for his next target.
'He was running around, still after the police officers came, with the sword in his hand looking for victims,' James Fernando said.
Mobile phone footage showed a bearded man, clad in a yellow Quiksilver hoodie, crouching outside a house scanning the street as police cars and an ambulance drew closer.
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