A POLICE marksman has told a jury that the man he shot dead with a sniper rifle had taken aim at him with a crossbow and was trying to kill him.

The officer, identified only as Officer E, was giving evidence from behind a curtain at the inquest of Keith Richards, who was killed in the early hours of May 12, 2009.

Mr Richards was heavily intoxicated that night, mired in debt and shouted at police from a bedroom window that a drink-driving conviction would ruin his life.

The agitated father-of-two fired several crossbow bolts at unarmed officers telling them to “bring on the armed police”

before he killed one of them or took his own life.

Officer E was one of three police marksmen who took up position behind a wall about 40 metres to the rear of Mr Richards’ home in Cheapside, Shildon, County Durham.

He told the jury Mr Richards was holding the crossbow in his right hand before he fired “indiscriminately”

at unarmed officers but that he was unable to take a shot.

“My unarmed colleagues were relying on me to take action,”

he said. “At that time I let them down.”

Officer E said Mr Richards was given several warnings from armed officers and even conversed with them before telling them: “I know where you are now.”

He told the jury Mr Richards, a former classroom assistant, aimed directly at him but at that point he was unsure of which hand he was holding the weapon in. “I believe at that time he was trying to kill me,” said Officer E.

“I have a picture that I have held in my head ever since but I can’t see in it which hand the crossbow is held in.”

Colin Hutchinson, a solicitor representing Mr Richards’ family, said the officer’s reference to a crossbow shot from a right-handed stance was “inconsistent with the hard and established facts”.

He cited pathologist Mark Egan who told the jury last week that Mr Richards was shot by a bullet which passed through his right hand and went into his chest.

Mr Egan said the injuries were consistent with the way a left-handed person might hold a weapon, which Mr Hutchinson said cast doubt on the officer’s statement.

Mr Hutchinson told Officer E: “What you can’t alter, officer, is these physical injuries which simply can’t be reconciled with Mr Richards having aimed at you.”

The jury, who had been told Mr Richards was right-handed, was read an entry from the force communications log, from that night, in which Officer E reported Mr Richards holding a crossbow in his left hand.

The hearing, at the Work Place, Newton Aycliffe, continues today.