A public inquiry into the 2023 Nottingham attacks has heard that police failed to warn the families of victims Barnaby Webber, Grace O'Malley-Kumar and Ian Coates that a mentally ill man obsessed with the case had been trying to track them down, and allegedly downplayed the threat he posed. The man, who had been sectioned and referred to the Prevent anti-extremism programme, travelled to Somerset seeking the Webber and O'Malley-Kumar families and visited the GP surgery of Grace's father, claiming he knew of a "cover-up". Families say they were left without safeguarding advice for well over a year, prompting fresh criticism of the authorities already blamed for failing to stop killer Valdo Calocane before the attacks.

Barnaby Webber's parents were reportedly not told of the man's journey to find them for 18 months, while Ian Coates' family say they were never officially informed at all. The man was later sectioned again after threatening ambulance workers in London and absconding from hospital in October, and although police eventually told the Webbers he was on the run, they did not disclose his history of threatening behaviour or fixation with the case. Nottinghamshire Police has referred itself to the Independent Office for Police Conduct, which has apologised, while the wider inquiry — which heard from 164 witnesses over more than three months, including former Chief Constable Kate Meynell, who admitted police had failed to act on an outstanding arrest warrant for Calocane — is due to report its findings next year.