Huntingdon victim's chilling 9-word plea revealed as 'knifeman rampaged through train'

A witness onboard the train in Huntingdon described the terrifying moment a fellow passenger tried to warn passengers of a knifeman on board.

Stephen Crean, one of the victims of the mass stabbing on a busy train in Cambridgeshire on Saturday, said he "didn't have much choice" but to fight back, as he recalls defending himself with nothing but his fists.

Stephen Crean, 61, told the PA news agency that he was returning home from watching Nottingham Forest draw 2-2 with Manchester United, when a young woman ran through his train carriage yelling "knife, knife, there's a man with a big knife".

Mr Crean said passengers ran down the carriage into the buffet car, adding: "There was nowhere to go. I didn't have much choice."

He said the knifeman asked if he wanted to die before he felt the knife in his arm.

"He asked me, 'Do you want to die?'," he told PA.

"He repeated it. Then I remember his knife going into my arm."

Mr Crean said the knife caught him several times as he confronted the attacker on the train.

"I got caught on my fingers. He took a swing at this, and a swing at that. I got caught on the head," he told the PA news agency.

"I was lucky. I got caught on the back a few times. They caught me a few times. The front of me, and my other arm. In the face and everything."

He added: "I'm going to need plastic surgery. One finger doesn't look clever. I've had stitches on them all.

"I don't know how long it's going to take."

A timeline of events:

Friday October 31 7.10pm - A 14-year-old is stabbed with a knife in Peterborough city centre and is taken to hospital, suffering minor injuries.

When police arrive at the scene, the suspect has fled and officers are unable to find them despite searching the area with a sniffer dog.

Friday October 31 7.25pm - A man is seen with a knife at a barber's shop in the Fletton area of Peterborough.

This is only reported to police nearly two hours later at 9.10pm, by which time he has left the scene.

Officers do not attend the shop but record a crime.

Saturday November 1 12.46am - Isaiah Ishmael Idris suffers facial injuries when he is attacked with a knife on a DLR train at Pontoon Dock in east London.

The suspect flees. Police later charge Anthony Williams, 32, from Peterborough with attempted murder.

Saturday November 1 9.25am - A second report is received by Cambridgeshire Police of a man with a knife at a barbers' shop in Fletton.

He is still at the scene at the time of the call, but when police arrive 18 minutes later, they are unable to find or identify him.

A crime is recorded.

Saturday November 1 7.30pm - A mass stabbing occurs on a train from Doncaster to London. Passenger alarms are pulled on the LNER service, causing it to stop at Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire.

By 7.39pm, Cambridgeshire Constabulary police have been called, with British Transport Police (BTP) on their way by 7.42pm.

Within eight minutes of the call to BTP, two men have been apprehended by armed officers, with one later released without charge.

Williams is charged with 10 counts of attempted murder, one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and one count of possession of a bladed article.

MORE UPDATES TO FOLLOW.