'You allowed the public to feel sorry for you when you used me as a punch bag': Policewoman beaten in Manchester Airport brawl brands attacker a 'coward' as he faces jail

By JAMES TOZER, NORTHERN CORRESPONDENT Published: 14:45, 26 June 2026 | Updated: 14:56, 26 June 2026 The policewoman left bloodied and sobbing after an attempted arrest at Manchester Airport turned violent has today branded her attacker a ‘coward’. As university dropout Mohammed Fahir Amaaz appeared at court to be sentenced for punching Lydia Ward in the face, breaking her nose, the mother-of-one accused him of showing ‘not one ounce’ of remorse for using her 'as a punch bag'. Delivering her powerful statement directly to the 21-year-old, the officer - now promoted to sergeant - told him: 'You changed my face.' She criticised Amaaz for having ‘played the victim’ when misleading footage of the aftermath of the incident filmed by onlookers went viral and having 'allowed the public to feel sorry for you'. Sgt Ward also movingly revealed she had been forced to bring her newborn child with her when she gave evidence, telling Amaaz a court was 'no place for a baby'  Challenging him to ‘take a good look at me’ and recognise the 5ft 2in, 8st woman behind the police uniform, she bravely spelt out the lasting physical and mental trauma caused by his shocking and unprovoked attack. ‘I want you to know I am not weak,’ Sgt Ward told Amaaz.  ‘No matter how this has affected me or impacted on my life I will not allow you to see me as weak. ‘You used me as a punch bag, but I will get back up and I will show you how strong I am.’ The second policewoman he battered, PC Ellie Cook, meanwhile told of how she has been left ‘broken’ and her dreams of one day becoming a close protection officer on hold. Unarmed officer PC Lydia Ward told jurors 'everything went black' when Mohammed Fahir Amaaz punched her, breaking her nose CCTV of Mohammed Fahir Amaaz, 21, swinging a punch and hitting PC Lydia Ward in the nose Mohammed Fahir Amaaz was convicted of causing actual bodily harm to PC Ward, who suffered a broken nose, and assaulting PC Cook In a case which sparked accusations of police racism and claims of two-tier justice, Amaaz and his brother Muhammad Amaad, 26, battled police officers beside a car park pay station at Manchester Airport's Terminal Two in July 2024. The incident erupted after Amaaz headbutted a Kuwaiti holidaymaker he had accused of racially abusing his mother Shameem Akhtar, whom they had met from an incoming flight from Pakistan via Qatar. Sgt Ward - then a constable - and two armed colleagues caught up with 19-year-old Amaaz as the group were paying for parking and they took hold of him from either side ahead of an attempt to arrest him. Instead, Amaaz fought back before both brothers – from Rochdale – began throwing punches at the officers. The teenager smashed Sgt Ward in the face, sending her sprawling to the ground, before repeatedly hitting PC Cook. His brother Amaad meanwhile overpowered PC Zachary Marsden and began raining punches down before Amaaz joined in. The brothers were finally both arrested after PC Cook fired her 50,000 volt Taser at Amaaz, who fell to the floor. Amid the confusion, PC Marsden kicked the teenager in the face and aimed a stamp close by. Mohammed Fahir Amaaz pictured arriving at court in July last year Mohammed Fahir Amaaz, 21 (left), and 26-year-old Muhammad Amaad pictured last year  Footage of the kick was filmed by onlookers and went viral when it went online, with protesters taking to the streets holding 'Black Lives Matter' placards and calling for the police to be 'defunded'. But there was a fierce backlash after leaked CCTV footage showed the violence PC Marsden and his two female colleagues had been subjected to just seconds earlier. To widespread public fury, it took 150 days for prosecutors to announce that PC Marsden would not be charged with any offence. Instead the brothers were charged with assaulting the three officers. A trial last year saw horrifying bodycam footage of the brutal violence meted out by Amaaz, throwing a total of ten punches in the melee. But while Amaaz was convicted of causing actual bodily harm to Sgt Ward and assaulting PC Cook, as well as assaulting the passenger, jurors could not reach verdicts on whether either brother had assaulted PC Marsden. In court they insisted that they were acting in self-defence or the defence of one another.  Amaaz also denied knowing two officers he punched in the face were female, saying he had ‘nothing but love and respect for women’. Firearms officer PC Zachary Marsden kicks Mohammed Fahir Amaaz in the face during the fracas at Manchester Airport in July 2024  Police bodyworn camera footage shown to the court shows PC Lydia Ward (left) being comforted by PC Cook afterwards PC Ellie Cook's bruised face after she was punched by Mohammed Fahir Amaaz – photograph issued by Crown Prosecution Service after being shown in court Last month a new jury at Liverpool Crown Court once again failed to reach verdicts on whether either had assaulted PC Marsden, with prosecutors controversially saying later that they would not be seeking a second retrial. This week Greater Manchester’s ‘anti-woke’ Chief Constable Sir Stephen Watson said he wanted anyone who assaulted his officers to be prosecuted to the ‘fullest extent of the law’ – but declined to criticise the decision. However detectives are understood to have been in favour of a third trial, the Manchester Evening News reported. Today Amaaz – who has been in custody on remand since being found guilty of attacking the policewomen – appeared by videolink from prison as he was sentenced. Delivering a powerful victim impact statement herself ahead of the sentence determined by Judge Neil Flewitt, Sgt Ward revealed the trauma of having to bring her baby to court when she gave evidence in the retrial as she was still breastfeeding him. Dressed in black trousers and a black and white sleeveless top, she spoke calmly but powerfully about how she still ‘struggles to make sense of it all’. Expressionless Amaaz - pictured on a TV screen and wearing a stripy T-shirt - looked straight ahead as Sgt Ward spelt out ‘how you made me feel and how you have changed who I am forever’. ‘Before I begin, I want you to take a good look at me,’ she said. ‘Take away that I am a police officer. Look at me, standing here. What do you see? ‘I’ll tell you what you see. You see a female. A female who is 5ft 2in and at the time of the incident I weighed no more than 8st. Firearms officer PC Zachary Marsden kicks Mohammed Fahir Amaaz, now 21, in the face during the fracas at Manchester Airport in July 2024 (pictured on footage from a colleague's body-worn camera) ‘You are a male and you chose to attack me without a second thought. ‘You chose to attack a female. You knocked me to the ground with one punch, with so much force you broke my nose.’ Sgt Ward challenged him: ‘How would you feel if it was your mother standing here today explaining how she was violently assaulted by a male? Sgt Ward said she joined the police eight years ago ‘because I wanted to help people’ and ‘took pride’ in her work. She added that while ‘conflict and violence’ were part of being in uniform, normally there are ‘indications that a situation is escalating’. ‘The day you attacked us was different,’ she said. ‘We were totally blindsided, and I felt like it came from nowhere. I never in a million years thought you would have attacked me the way you did.’ The officer told Amaaz she remembered him looking ‘directly into my eyes’ before throwing the punch. Asked in court why he resisted arrest, Mohammed Fahir Amaaz said: 'It felt like we were fighting for our lives.' ‘Could you see how scared I was? I was petrified. I just remember hitting the floor and thinking “This is it”. I felt instant pain and then I saw the blood. ‘I have never seen anyone so violent. I have never been so scared. It was utterly terrifying.’ Sgt Ward said she was ‘angered’ by how Amaaz initially ‘played the victim’ when ‘only part of the footage was out in the public’. ‘You are not a victim,’ she said. ‘I am the one who was injured, not you. You had the whole world listening to you and you showed no remorse. Not one ounce. ‘You allowed the public to feel sorry for you. You made out like we had done something wrong when all we were doing was our job.’ Sgt Ward said she needed an operation to fix her nose and still has a scar and a lump on her brow. ‘I look at myself now and I can see the difference in my face compared to how it was before this happened. ‘You did that to me. You changed my face. What was it that I did that was so wrong you felt you needed to attack me? ‘I fear for the women in your life. If you can do that to a female police officer, what are you capable of to the women you know? I want you to know I am not weak. ‘No matter how this has affected me or impacted on my life I will not allow you to see me as weak. You used me as a punch bag, but I will get back up and I will show you how strong I am.’ She also spoke of the ‘stress’ of having to attend court to give evidence during the first trial last year a month before being due to give birth. Then the prospect of a retrial meant her ordeal was ‘hanging over me’ when she was meant to be enjoying bonding with her baby, even having to bring the infant to court with her. ‘I shouldn’t have had to bring my baby to court,’ she told Amaaz. ‘It is no place for a baby.’ Finally she told him: ‘You deserve no more of my time.’ In PC Cook’s victim impact statement – read out by prosecutor Paul Greaney KC – she told Amaaz how her life that day ‘changed forever’. Having joined the police in 2018, she was ‘loving’ her new role as a firearms officer but her ‘dream’ was to one day join the Met Police as a close protection officer. ‘I don’t think you will ever begin to understand what you have done to me, or my family,' she said. ‘I used to be happy. I used to be driven. I used to be focused. I am now broken.’ PC Cook said being called out to arrest a suspect over a headbutting ‘sounded like a routine job’, adding: ‘How wrong I was. ‘I remember feeling punches in quick succession and with such power behind them that I thought I was being attacked by 3-4 people. ‘I was terrified. The pain was excruciating with each blow, my vision went black, and I was so disorientated.’ Recalling how she managed to deploy her Taser despite her injuries, she asked Amaaz: ‘What would you have done if I hadn’t?’ In the weeks that followed, PC Cook said she ‘threw myself back into work’. ‘I thought I was fine, but I wasn’t.’ Seven months later she was signed off work with trauma, saying she still feels ‘trapped’ in the events of that day. As a result she has given up being a firearms officer, meaning her career aspirations are ‘on hold’. ‘It hurts and upsets me that you chose to spin the narrative the way you did,’ she said to Amaaz. ‘All you needed to do was to say you had made a massive mistake, own it. ‘But instead, you chose to put us all at risk, even yourselves. Each of our faces were plastered all over national news. Everyone knew who we were. I had to move out of my home, a home where I felt safe and secure. For what? For doing my job?’ And she told Amaaz: ‘I hope the words I have read today stay with you for the rest of your life. I hope you have flashbacks of what I am saying the way I have flashbacks of that day. ‘I hope you never forget, because I know I won’t.’ Last month prosecutors announced they would not be seeking a second retrial after two juries had deliberated for almost 30 hours, with a grinning Amaad walking free from court to cheers and applause. Earlier Mr Greaney KC said after consideration 'at the highest level' the CPS had decided it could not 'lawfully' seek a third trial of either brother. Afterwards the brothers' lawyer accused PC Marsden of 'taking a "rugby style" kick' at Amaaz's head and called for him to be placed on trial. Aamer Anwar also claimed the brothers had been 'subjected to an orgy of race hate' online since being charged, alleging social media had contributed to a 'lynch mob mentality'. Neither of the brothers had been in trouble with the police before, and six members of the family – including older brother Abid – are current or former officers with Greater Manchester Police. PC Marsden remains under investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) which could still refer him back to the Crown Prosecution Service for potential charges. A second male Greater Manchester Police officer who along with PC Marsden confronted bystanders filming the brawl also remains under investigation. The same officer is also understood to have been placed under criminal investigation by the IOPC over the leaking of CCTV footage of the altercation to the Manchester Evening News. The comments below have been moderated in advance. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.