BOBBIES ON A BABY BEAT

PCs Greg Brown and Gary Meadows radioed ahead to Eastbourne District General Hospital to warn medical staff of the crisis.

They got the woman to the maternity unit in time ... only to be later told that that she was not yet quite ready to give birth.

The bizarre incident began near the Phoenix Place, Lewes, yard of Courtin and Warner, distributors of pharmaceutical materials.

Nearby workmen rang police after spotting a man, a heavily pregnant woman and a five-year-old boy fleeing from a parked lorry.

The family had apparently slashed the canvas side of the lorry, which had just arrived from Hungary, to make their getaway towards the railway station.

They were, however, rounded up in Court Road.

At that point, when police were driving them to the police station, the second drama unfolded.

'The woman started contractions,' said Acting Inspector Dave Padwick. 'There was no doubt about that.

'The officers made her as comfortable as possible while they drove as quickly as they could to hospital.

'It was a pretty desperate situation. They could have found themselves delivering the baby.

'The Kosovan man was shaking. The little boy was bemused by the whole situation.

'The false alarm could have been brought about by the stress and trauma the poor woman had been through.'

The driver of the lorry, carrying pharmaceutical materials, was not from England.

Said Roy Gooch, managing director of Courtin and Warner: 'Everyone here was amazed that such a thing could happen this distance from the port.

'You would have thought they would have got out sooner.'

As the Express went to press this week the woman had still not given birth.

The family are claiming political asylum and are staying in a London refugee centre.

Four Kurdistani refugees were arrested on May 30 after being found hiding in the pallet storage bay of a lorry parked at Roche Diagnostics in Bell Lane, Lewes.

Published: 22.6.01 Sussex Newspapers Ltd