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Story perspectives

Reopened Bridge Case Leads to Driver’s Arrest

6/18/2026

45 4 Full Breakdown

Summary

Story summary

Police reopened the nine-year-old case and arrested a 44-year-old man at his £1.4 million west-London home.
Bus driver Oliver Salbris swerved bus on Putney Bridge, saying he would have smashed her head, and is in custody.
The 2017 surveillance video, viewed millions of times, prompted the Met to interview over 50 men and inspired the 2024 play Once Upon a Bridge, whose creator urges witnesses to contact police with new information.

History

Historical Context

In February 1999 Sir William Macpherson delivered the Macpherson Report, ordered by Home Secretary Jack Straw in July 1997, costing £4.2 million and issuing 70 reform recommendations after finding the Metropolitan Police institutionally racist. The 2024 reopening of the Putney Bridge case—triggered by Oliver Salbris’s bus incident and a 2017 CCTV clip—echoes that mandate to pursue new evidence and restore public confidence.

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Story summary

Police reopened the nine-year-old case and arrested a 44-year-old man at his £1.4 million west-London home.
Bus driver Oliver Salbris swerved bus on Putney Bridge, saying he would have smashed her head, and is in custody.
The 2017 surveillance video, viewed millions of times, prompted the Met to interview over 50 men and inspired the 2024 play Once Upon a Bridge, whose creator urges witnesses to contact police with new information.

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