‘Heroic’ worker praised as man charged over UK train stabbings

The attack occurred on the busy service between Doncaster, in northern England, and King's Cross Station in the capital. The incident forced the train to stop at Huntingdon Station, in Cambridgeshire. Photo / Chris Radburn, AFP

A man has been charged with 10 counts of attempted murder following a mass stabbing on a London-bound train, as a critically wounded train worker was hailed as a hero for stepping in to protect passengers.

Transport police said the suspected attacker, Anthony Williams, 32, also faced a separate attempted murder charge over another incident at a train station in London hours earlier on Saturday (local time).

He appeared in court on Monday and was remanded in custody.

“He went in to do his job and he left work a hero. And there are people who are alive today because of his actions and his bravery,” Transport Minister Heidi Alexander said of the train worker wounded on Saturday evening.

Alexander also praised the driver, whose quick thinking ensured it was able to make an unscheduled emergency stop at Huntingdon in eastern England that allowed passengers to escape the train.

Police are also probing whether Williams was involved in three other knife incidents in his hometown of Peterborough on Friday and Saturday, including one in which a 14-year-old was stabbed.

Cambridgeshire Police said it had referred itself to Britain’s independent police watchdog to scrutinise its response to those incidents.

Ten people were wounded in Saturday’s train knife rampage.

The train company employee who was injured remains in hospital in a critical but stable condition.

The train’s driver Andrew Johnson, who served in the Royal Navy for 17 years, said his onboard colleagues were the “real heroes”.

“I’d like to pay tribute to their bravery,” he said in a statement.

Scunthorpe United football club, meanwhile, named its defender Jonathan Gjoshe as one of the victims, adding that he was receiving inpatient treatment for non-life-threatening injuries.

The train had been travelling from northern England to London’s King’s Cross Station about 7.40pm on Saturday.

Passengers told of seeing victims with stab wounds fleeing through the train, warning others to escape.

“He asked me, ‘Do you want to die?’,” victim Stephen Crean told the Press Association news agency.

“He repeated it. Then I remember his knife going into my arm.”

‘Heroic’

Chief investigation officer Stuart Cundy also paid tribute to the injured train company employee.

“Having viewed the CCTV from the train, the actions of the member of rail staff were nothing short of heroic and undoubtedly saved people’s lives,” he said.

Four other people remained in hospital though their condition was not life-threatening.

Alexander said there would be an increase in visible police patrols on trains in coming days to reassure the public.

The incident had been “absolutely horrific” but the UK rail network was generally among the “safest forms of public transport anywhere in the world”, she told Sky News.

The arrested man was not known to counter-terrorism police or the security services, she added.

Interior minister Shabana Mahmood told Parliament the incident had been “an isolated attack”.

Her ministry said that all knife crime was down 5% between September 2024 and October this year.

Williams faces 10 counts of attempted murder, one of actual bodily harm and one of possessing a knife in connection with the train stabbings, said the Crown Prosecution Service.

Following an earlier incident at a train station in east London in the early hours of Saturday, he also faces another charge of attempted murder and possessing a knife.

- Agence France-Presse