POLICE AWARDS: LAST September, Rod Stacy-Marks, an inspector at Corsham Police Station, was clearing his office on his final day there, when he received a call about a violent domestic situation.

The occupant of a house in Corsham's Methuen Way a man with a history of mental illness had produced a rifle and was pointing it at his estranged wife and his community psychiatric nurse.

Insp Stacy-Marks, 44, went to the house with PC Shaun Hunt. The inspector then talked to the man long enough to enable his captives to escape.

Insp Stacy-Marks, who has been a police officer for 14 years and is married with two children, later withdrew but stayed at the scene and the man again levelled the rifle at him, threatening to blow up the house after turning on the gas supply.

The incident took eight hours to resolve. Police negotiators eventually succeeded in getting the man to give himself up and the incident ended peacefully.

Insp Stacy-Marks, of Devizes, received a certificate of commendation from the Chief Constable at last week's awards ceremony for his courage and professionalism while dealing with the armed man.

Just two months before the incident, Insp Stacy-Marks spent five hours negotiating with an armed man who took a woman hostage at a house in Woodlands Road, Chippenham.

He said: "My family were more concerned about me when I was dealing with the hostage incident at Chippenham, even though I was in no personal danger.

"At the time the incident in Corsham was happening my family didn't know the full extent of it. Afterwards they were relieved and they appreciated my motives for doing my job to the best of my ability."

Insp Stacy-Marks, who now works in the control room at police headquarters in Devizes, played down his heroism.

He said: "My main concern was for the people in the house, the man's wife and his nurse, because they had done absolutely nothing wrong and they didn't deserve to be confronted with a guy with a gun.

"I get paid for dealing with this type of situation and I was focusing on getting suitable resources to the scene to limit any damage or danger to people in the area.

"There were a couple of occasions when I thought I didn't like being there but I had a job to do.

"It was worrying when he pointed the rifle at me but I was wearing body armour. As he hadn't fired at me initially and as the situation progressed I thought there was less chance of him firing at anybody."

He said his award was as much for the efforts of the other officers involved as for himself.