In a startling report, it’s been revealed that the acting commissioner of the Metropolitan Police was present at the scene of the Westminster terror attack in 2017, but locked his car doors and stayed in his vehicle as it happened.

Sir Craig Mackey, now deputy commissioner, had been leaving Westminster Palace following a meeting, when Khalid Masood mowed down pedestrians with his vehicle near the building and then attacked police officer Keith Palmer with two carving knives who later died from his injuries.

Mackey told Britain’s ITV News that it was his “instinct” to get out and help, but had “no protective equipment, no radio, and two colleagues… who were quite distressed”.

Further clarifying, Mackey added:

If anyone had got out, the way this Masood was looking, anyone who got in his way would have been a target. I think anyone who came up against that individual would have faced serious, serious injury, if not death.

Palmer was unarmed at the time of the attack, just like Mackey, and couldn’t count on any help from the head of police. Instead, Craig Mackey and his “colleagues” watched as one of their own, an innocent man, was murdered on the street.

Furthermore, the coroner who examined Palmer said that the Westminster attack could have been prevented if not for the “shortcomings” of London police. The coroner explained:

Due to shortcomings in the security system at New Palace Yard… The armed officers were not aware of a requirement to remain in close proximity to the gates. Had they been stationed there it is possible that they may have been able to prevent Palmer suffering fatal injuries.

Armed officers were present at the Palace at the time of the attack, but were on the other end of the grounds – unable to react in time to the 83-second attack where Palmer was stabbed and killed.

The armed officers had left the carriage gate, where Palmer was standing by, unguarded for almost an hour.

So not only did Mackey, the head of Metropolitan Police, fail Palmer; armed officers unaware of their job duties were unable to put an end to a terrorist situation. Only by chance did a political protection officer happen to be nearby, who shot and killed Masood in the middle of his rampage.

London spectacularly failed an officer who was said to “care” about the job he was doing, which seems to be becoming exceedingly more rare across the U.K.

It’s true that you don’t know how you would personally respond to a situation like the one perpetrated by Masood but one would think the head of London’s Metropolitan Police force would at least try to quarantine and stop a terrorist attack rather than lock the doors to his vehicle and watch it all unfold from the safety of his car.

Sadly, it seems the government or top authority officials are unable to deal with and handle the growing threat of terrorism across the U.K. – with the burden falling on ordinary citizens to bear alone.

Editor’s note: Maybe its time for the UK to rethink that whole “police officers don’t need guns” thing?