Southport attack Man who took on killer wishes he had been 'more like Bruce Willis'

A man who suffered a 12cm-deep leg wound tackling the Southport attacker said yesterday he wished he could have done more to prevent the fatal stabbings by behaving like a Bruce Willis action hero.

- Matthew Weaver

John Hayes, 63, also called on the government to do more to address the root causes of the unrest that has followed the killing of three girls in the attack on a Taylor Swift-themed dance and yoga class. But he said Southport wanted to distance itself from the unrest as it came to terms with the atrocity.

Bebe King, six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice Dasilva Aguiar, nine, were killed in the knife attack last week that left nine other children and the class teacher injured.

Hayes, who is a director of a company in the same building as the Hart Space studio where the killings happened, described the attacker as "like a crouching tiger" when he confronted him.