- Cleveland Police have launched a manhunt after a 39-year-old man suffered severe arm and hand wounds during an assault involving a bladed weapon on Sedgemoor Road in Eston, Middlesbrough, on Thursday.
- The stabbing is the latest in a series of violent incidents in Middlesbrough this week, occurring shortly after a vehicle was reported crashing into the wall of a residential property on Steele Crescent in South Bank.
- The recent incidents took place near the scene of a fatal house fire in Grangetown on Wednesday morning, which tragically killed seven-year-old Valentina Foster and her 34-year-old aunt Natalie McDonald.
- Two men, aged 23 and 31, have been arrested on suspicion of murder regarding the fatal blaze, while a 48-year-old woman remains in a critical condition at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle.
- Officers are conducting early-stage enquiries to determine whether these recent events are connected to each other, to organised crime, or to a crash on the A66 on Saturday in which seven people – including two police officers – died.
IN FULL
