The Moat chase is over

He killed himself when, I guess, he finally got tired of it.

Something commenter Keith got that's not in the article:
He'd broken into a house yesterday, in a village hosting about 10% or more of Britain's armed cops, while the lady was getting the kids from school.

she'd returned, found her kitchen turned upside down and called the cops.

FIFTEEN minutes later, two UNARMED cops arrived. refused to enter, called for armed officers and went away.

The bouncer then came back and took some clean clothes from the house and left again in the FIFTEEN minutes more that it took for armed cops to get there.

This is going to take some whitewashing over.
Here's another article, at the Sun. Which includes After Moat shot himself, witnesses said cops swarmed around and jumped on him. And seems Keith isn't the only one thinking the police have some explaining to do:
COPS were last night accused of a string of blunders after Raoul Moat remained free under their noses for almost a week.
...
Moat was finally cornered a few hundred yards from where his getaway car was found four days earlier. During the hunt Northumbria Police apologised after an inspector called Moat a "nutter".

His ex Samantha Stobbart, who he attacked, was apparently given NO police protection. Another former girlfriend who warned he would hide in Rothbury said her statement was not taken seriously.

Cops also held back details of his getaway car.
Personally, I don't think calling him a nutter was exactly a large problem, but I guess they decided he was being insensitive.

The Brit cops showed the same problem we've got over here: they had the guy pinned and yet kept around enough people to fight a company-size infantry action, which makes as much sense as O.J. Simpson driving along with a third of LAPD following him. EVERYBODY wants in on it. Something like that, do the brass just want everyone around they can get, or don't they bother to cut the numbers down?

Down near the bottom of the Sun article there's a picture of five cops: two have subguns aimed at the guy and a third is behind a ballistic shield pointing a Taser.

I think he was being a bit optimistic about that...

So this mess is over. And the circus of explanations and defenses and excuses begins.