Three brave police officers risked their lives to save a woman from drowning.
The three men supported the woman in the River Chelmer for 20 minutes in the early hours of Saturday while thugs threw bottles at them.
The 21-year-old, of Braintree, who was said to be "extremely intoxicated", was unconscious after jumping into the water
Fire crews used specialist equipment to get her out and she was taken to Broomfield Hospital, Chelmsford, to be treated and discharged.
Sgt Lloyd Page, the first into the water, had been on foot patrol with colleagues in Chelmsford town centre, cracking down on public order offences, and had approached the public house Edwards, in Springfield Road, at about 1.30am.
He said: "There was a big group of people and the young woman came to my attention when I saw her flying over the barrier and I heard a big splash.
"I don't know why she went in but she was extremely intoxicated and a witness who did not know her said she handed her her purse and just dived in."
He added she was not getting very far and her arms were "flying everywhere" when she just stopped face down in the water.
"It was clear she was in trouble. She was just a lifeless body floating in the river and I jumped in."
But the river bank has concrete sides and the officer had nowhere to hang on to and was in too deep to stand up when he got to the woman.
He swam to the side with her, where he had seen some hand railings and stayed there, trying to keep her head out of the water.
It was then Sgt Page's colleagues, PCs Alan Pitcher and Steve King, joined him in the water.
Sgt Page said: "One was assisting me trying to keep her head out of the water, paddling furiously and trying to communicate with her, the other was trying to secure a rope around her body."
But because the woman's body was so limp, it was impossible to make the rope secure, he said.
At this point, he said, there was a crowd of people standing on the bank and bottles were thrown at the officers.
Police back-up arrived and controlled the crowds, while Chelmsford fire service got the woman out with specialist equipment
Published Monday, June 16, 2003
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