Armed police arrest gardener taking trowel home from allotment

A gardener was arrested by armed police for "carrying a knife" while returning home with gardening tools from his allotment. Samuel Rowe, 35, was held in a cell and cautioned by police after they accused him of carrying a "large dagger" last month.

He had just finished tending to his allotment vegetable patch and was trimming the hedges outside his home with a sickle when armed police descended on July 3. Samuel had his Japanese gardening trowel, a sickle and a fruit harvesting tool seized before being taken to a police station.

He was then detained in a cell for over seven hours before he was released by police when he accepted a caution for possession of an offensive weapon. The theatre manager said he was left terrified when officers armed with guns arrived outside his home and now wants the caution overturned.

The keen gardener, from Manchester, said: "I was coming back from my allotment in the morning. I'd just got home and started trimming the hedge at the top of my house, and then I heard shouting and it was armed police – two armed police telling me to 'drop the knife'.

"At the time I had my Japanese gardening sickle in my hand that I was using, so I dropped that along with the privet I'd been cutting. Then they turned me around, pushed me up against the house, handcuffed me behind my back, took everything out my belt.

"Then they asked me why I was there and where I'd been. Eventually they bundled me into the back of their van and transported me to Cheadle Hulme police station, which is miles away from my house. They got it into their heads that I was some sort of extremist wandering about with knives."

READ MORE: Prince Andrew 'slept with more than dozen women in first year of marriage', book claims

READ MORE: Ibiza Final Boss Jack Kay's girlfriend speaks out after incredible haircut goes viral

Samuel claims he was then held in cells and asked whether he wanted a solicitor, but he never managed to see one. He said: "It was a good seven hours before an officer was assigned my case.

"They came back and said 'we've tried contacting this solicitor three times and they've not answered the phone'. They said 'we can ring them again, start the process again with another solicitor, or you do the interview without a solicitor'.

"By this point I was pretty traumatised, I'd spent hours in a cell with the lights going dim, going bright again over periods of time. I didn't know exactly what time it was.

"I'd tried getting to phone my partner to let her know where I was, with five different people, each time it was like the first time I'd asked. Then this officer eventually took me out, it must have been 7.30 or 8pm at this point, to let my partner know, and all they did was ring her up and tell her where I was.

"They said 'to be honest, it's a courtesy call, he'll ring you when he gets out'."

During questioning, Samuel claims police posed bizarre questions such as what an allotment was. He said: "It didn't fill me with any kind of confidence I was going to be treated fairly, because I'd been arrested doing my gardening with what they were telling me was an offensive weapon.

READ MORE: Woman loses 20lbs in eight weeks without setting foot in the gym

READ MORE: Elderly mum and son stuck in Travelodge living off Pot Noodles after eviction

"All the way through the interview I was saying 'this is what I had on me, if you look this up on the internet all these gardening sites will come up with gardening tools'. One of the armed officers took one of them out of the pouch which was branded with the gardening brand – the kind of thing you see hanging off the belt of people on Gardener's World.

"It's not a weird thing to have on me, but they just weren't listening. I was explaining I had good reason to take them to and from my allotment, I said my allotment isn't secure – people can break in and steal stuff, as they often do."

Samuel's partner had gifted him the £32 Niwaki Hori Hori weeding trowel, which was in a sheath on his belt at the time of the arrest, for his birthday. The £10 Ice Bear gardener's sickle was bought from an online garden centre, while the fruit harvesting tool – which he's still not been returned – was a family heirloom from his late grandmother.

Samuel continued: "It makes me angry, because they shouldn't have it. I'm still upset about her dying, and they just took it off me." Samuel has been growing fruit and vegetables such as rhubarb, broad beans, artichokes, and tomatoes, at his allotment since 2022.

After a two-year wait on his local council's waiting list, he was allocated a plot. Now he is worried that the police caution he accepted might show up on background checks for future job applications.

Samuel is now campaigning to have the caution removed from his record. He explained: "I've done absolutely nothing wrong in the past, because I didn't want to have any contact with the police.

"I got a phone call [afterwards] from Greater Manchester's mental health team who were then asking for questions about my lifestyle, religion, and that kind of thing. It's not a large dagger – it's a tool for digging with, and I kept telling them that. It's not a peeling knife either, because why would I have a potato peeler in my pocket? It doesn't make sense."

Greater Manchester Police said armed officers were dispatched as they were nearest to the location after being notified by a member of the public. The force denies any claims that Samuel was refused legal counsel, asserting that they attempted to reach a solicitor multiple times and ultimately, he opted to decline legal advice.

A spokesperson for Greater Manchester Police said: "At around 12.20pm on 3 July, we acted on a call from a member of the public that a man was walking in public wearing khaki clothing and in possession of a knife.

“Nearby officers were flagged down by the caller, who directed them towards a male. He was subsequently stopped and a small sickle, a large dagger which was in a sheath on a belt, and a peeling knife, were seized.

“He was arrested on suspicion of possession of an offensive weapon and taken into custody. He admitted the offence and was given a conditional caution, which entailed advice and guidance around the legislation of knives and bladed weapons in a public place.”