Gunfight footage drama unfolds

Warring factions were caught on camera as they shot, stabbed and attacked each other - today the Express & Star can reveal exclusive images of the frightening confrontation as it developed.

It was witnessed by shoppers, motorists and bus passengers, some of whom fled for cover as bullets flew.

The drama began with a fight between two men - Gary Williams and Isaac Frazer. Driving through Wolverhampton, Williams, who has a history of violence and goes by the street name G-Bo, spotted Frazer.

No real motive has ever been revealed for what happened next, but the pair were said by one of the defendants to "not get on".

After spotting Frazer, Williams was said to have sped round a corner, jumped out of his car and raced down a pathway to confront his enemy.

Williams pulled out a handgun and fired at his target. But the gun malfunctioned, exploding and sending shrapnel into Williams's face.

A woman dived for cover behind a wall, while other pedestrians fled. Stunned and covered in blood, Williams scuffled with Frazer before both men fled.

In the melee, Williams managed to grab the gun, flee and and dump it in a nearby drain. But the day of violence was far from over.

Furious Frazer was said to have phoned "re-enforcements" in the shape of Craig Stubbs, Jamie Wint and Lincoln Edwards.

Wint was said to have been handed a gun which had been delivered to Temple Street by a motorbike "courier".

As Williams, who had lost his keys during the scuffle 20 minutes earlier, tried to push his black Toyota Corolla from where he dumped it in Temple Street, Frazer and his gang rounded a corner.

What happened next was caught in shocking CCTV footage which was shown to the jury.

Frazer pulled out a gun and fired at Williams. With Stubbs and Edwards right behind him, he raised his arm to get a better aim at Williams.

Frazer again fired, causing Williams and Wiley to cower.

Iraq war veteran Roger Moore, aged 43, was being driven by his wife in Temple Street - 10 yards away from Frazer.

He told Wolverhampton Crown Court: "I said to my wife 'Put your foot down and get round the corner'."

Gary Williams and Carl Wiley, however, appeared unphased. In an amazing display of defiance, the pair mocked and jeered at Frazer after his gun apparently jammed.

Angrily waving their arms and striding towards him, they were said to have believed that Frazer was firing only blanks.

Then in the final bloody chapter, the groups brawled on a pedestrian crossing in front of a bus and other motorists.

Williams slashed and stabbed Wint with a knife, as Wiley battered him with a chunk of concrete. Both attackers apparently believed he was still carrying a gun.

The groups fled. A battered and blood-stained Wint was picked up by a passing DHL van and taken to New Cross Hospital.

Opening the case, Mr Peter Cooke, prosecuting, said: "They were quite brazen in their display of violence on public streets.

"Guns were involved, produced from within clothing or bags and brandished openly. "They were fired with complete disregard, not just for the people at who they were aimed, but for members of the public nearby."

The afternoon of violence sparked one of the biggest, and ultimately most successful, investigations ever carried out by Wolverhampton police.

A major investigation led by Dc Keith Gibbs, from Operation Engage, worked round the clock as officers sifted through hours of footage. Armed police raids were launched within hours of the attack.

An Express & Star reader captured the moment when firearms officers surrounded a house in the road where Craig Stubbs lived. The wealth of CCTV footage of the shooting meant that police knew who they were looking for.

Most of the men were arrested very quickly but one - Gary Williams - evaded capture for weeks. Police even asked Williams's father to get his son to contact officers

Williams is no stranger to violence. Today it can be revealed that he was on early release from prison for another stabbing - amazingly also in Temple Street.

He knifed a reveller following a row at the former Beach nightclub in April 2001. The victim spent eight days in intensive care and a further month under treatment in hospital after the main blood vessel in his stomach was severed.

When judges refused his appeal against the sentence, they said he was lucky not to be serving life for murder. Security around the court case was high.

Jurors were given a police escort when they visited the scene of the shooting. And officers were stationed inside and outside outside courtroom number seven for much of the trial.