SIRENS blared in the background as Abingdon’s new police commander spoke of his “safe and low-crime area”.

At the time, he was not aware that his officers were rushing to the scene of a fatal stabbing, just weeks after Kerry Reeves was killed in the town.

Superintendent Rory Freeman spoke to the Oxford Mail in Abingdon’s Colwell Drive police station earlier this month, as Justin Skrebowski was stabbed to death at the town’s Poundland store less than a mile away.

Regarding the death of Ms Reeves, who was fatally shot last month, he said: “Anything like that is just shocking and terrible.” And Supt Freeman, 45, who replaced Jim O’Ryan on December 1 as South and Vale’s local police authority commander, added: “It’s not lost on me that back in May we had the triple murder in Didcot.

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“These things tend to impact more on smaller communities, it strikes fear right into the heart of communities that something like that could happen right next door. People are rightly concerned.”

“You’ve had people murdered so something’s happened in the lead-up to that, to get to that tragic situation – whether this is something the police would know about, our partners would know about, or someone in the family would know about. There’s a chain of events.”

On other policing issues, he added his officers were being “vigilant” of terrorism in the heightened national security situation.

He said his other priorities would be targeting human trafficking, child sexual abuse, burglary and crime linked to binge drinking.

He added: “It’s a challenge to police huge rural areas, but whatever happens I’m confident that I can. We’ve got a number of challenges for the future but we are a safe and low-crime area.”

Supt Freeman, who lives in Oxfordshire with his wife and two young daughters, said public support for the police was vital.

He said: “If we lose the trust of the public there’s no chance for the police. We are not going to be able to solve crime ourselves.”

Favouring “innovative” ways of tackling crime, he said on-the-ground officers were not always essential.

He said: “You don’t have to have police officers for people to feel safe. The emphasis is around prevention.”

Supt Freeman brings 23 years’ police experience to his role, including protest management and body recovery. His previous position was head of criminal justice at Thames Valley Police’s Kidlington headquarters.

Speaking of his new job in charge of policing in the South and Vale, Supt Freeman said: “This role carries with it real responsibility that sits on your shoulders.

“People want clarity in a very complex world and it’s not easy to give that.”

“The mark of society is safety and a lot of the time they look to the police commander to provide that.”

He added he was confident any changes to the policing budget would not affect its efficiency. He said: “I don’t know what’s to come, but the option of not trying to improve isn’t there.”