Ashbourne Road gunman released on bail

Police have said that the gunman spotted walking along Ashbourne Road in the early hours of New Year's Day has been released on bail.

Residents spotted the man, who appeared to be carrying a gun, staggering down the street at around 3am, and alerted police.

Officers then sealed the road off, before arresting the man, who has yet to be named. They later recovered an air weapon at a nearby address.

Inspector John Townsend, of Staffordshire Police, said: "Armed officers were deployed to the incident. But it was safely resolved when a man was arrested and an air rifle recovered from an address in Leek."

"No-one was injured in the incident and we are not looking for anyone else in connection with our inquiries."

Yesterday, residents told the Sentinel of their fear and astonishment at seeing an armed man in their street just hours after they had celebrated the start of 2012.

"We could see this man walking down the street with a gun," one said. "He was drunk and falling all over the place. My husband thought it was a plastic gun but I could tell it wasn't."

Another neighbour, a mother-of-three, told the Sentinel: "It seems like he had walked a little way with the gun. A lot of people were looking out of their windows and were scared to draw attention to themselves."

"You could tell he was drunk, which made it even more worrying."