Last words of MP Jo Cox revealed as police probe far-right extremism links to her suspected killer
The father of her assistant revealed how his daughter desperately tried to help the MP as she bled on the street
DYING Jo Cox was cradled in the street by her aide after being blasted by a gunman and cried: “I’m in too much pain”.
Assistant Fazila Aswat ran to the Labour MP’s side and lashed out at the attacker with her handbag before he forced her back.
He then fired twice more at Jo, shooting her in the head with the third and final shot.
Heroic Fazila begged her friend: “Jo, get up” — but the mum of two said: “I can’t make it.”
Her last words were revealed by Fazila’s dad yesterday.
Gulham Maniyar said Jo had got out of her car for a constituency meeting at Birstall library, West Yorks, when the killer opened fire with a sawn-off rifle.
Mr Maniyar said: “By the time my daughter came out of the car she saw Jo on the floor.
“She tried to help her but she couldn’t do anything. She’d been stabbed and shot. She said Jo’s injury was so bad and she was in her arms. There was lots of blood.
“She said, ‘Jo, get up,’ but Jo said, ‘No, my pain is too much, Fazila. I can’t make it’.
“I think those were the last words Jo spoke. Fazila could not do anything else. She tried to comfort her. Then the police and air ambulance came.
“My daughter’s clothes were full of blood. She tried to hit the attacker with her handbag but he tried to go at her.
“People came so he followed them and he came back and shot Jo again twice.
“My daughter is in shock. She’s been with Jo for a year and working very closely with her.
He added: “To me Jo was like a daughter because she always called me ‘Uncle’. I saw her three days ago.
She was campaigning in town and she rang me and I went there.
“She took a picture with me and some colleagues. She was there smiling.”
Fazila’s brother Ahmed added: “She’s physically OK but I imagine she’s just very shaken up, distressed and upset.
“It’s very raw. The last time I saw Jo she was sat with her five-year-old in her lap. That’s my last image of her. It’s heartbreaking.”
The killer, reportedly heard shouting: “Put Britain first”, is believed to have blamed Jo for concentrating too much on Europe and Syria-related issues at a time when local mental health services were cut back.
A husband's grief: Partner of Jo Cox posts poignant picture of murdered MP and mum-of-two ‘who lived every day to the full
The distraught husband of Jo Cox posted a heartbreaking photo of his late wife just hours after she was shot dead in the street by a gunman.
And in a heart-rending tribute to the 41-year-old mother-of-two, Brendan said: "Today is the beginning of a new chapter in our lives.
"More difficult, more painful, less joyful, less full of love.
"I and Jo's friends and family are going to work every moment of our lives to love and nurture our kids and to fight against the hate that killed Jo.
"Jo believed in a better world and she fought for it every day of her life with an energy, and a zest for life that would exhaust most people.
"She would have wanted two things above all else to happen now, one that our precious children are bathed in love and two, that we all unite to fight against the hatred that killed her.
"Hate doesn't have a creed, race or religion, it is poisionous.
"Jo would have no regrets about her life, she lived every day of it to the full."
Elected to parliament in May last year, Cox led a life devoted to service and helping those less fortunate than herself.
A vocal campaigner for charity Oxfam, the Cambridge graduate had fought to see the UK provide aid to help Syrian refugees fleeing the country’s civil war.
Suspect Thomas Mair, 52, was passed mentally fit for interview yesterday.
Mair, nicknamed Marigold because of his love for gardening in rubber gloves, was due to appear before Westminster magistrates this morning.
A witness yesterday told how he had arrived at the Wellbeing Centre in Birstall at 6.30pm on Wednesday but fled after 20 minutes as more people arrived for a drop-in session.
Mrs Walker, manager of the centre for 12 years, said: “He was depressed and taking medication. He was nervous and he couldn’t make eye contact.
“He said he had been suffering with depression for many years and was keen to try alternative therapies like massage and reflexology. There was clearly a problem. He was having a crisis.
“He didn’t have any friends or anyone to talk to and literally walked in off the street.”
A 77-year-old man who rugby-tackled the gunman during Thursday’s attack was last night hailed a hero.
Bernard Kenny was knifed in the stomach.
The blade narrowly missed his heart and lungs but punctured his liver. He had an operation yesterday and was serious but stable.
Brave Bernard, a former trade unionist with the Coal Board, had been waiting to pick up wife, Doreen, 76, from the library.
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He was already a hero after saving the lives of miners during the Lofthouse Colliery disaster in 1973 which killed seven.
Neighbour Tony Robinson, 40, said: “Bernard deserves a medal for what he did. It doesn’t surprise me when people were running one way, he was going the other way to help. That is typical of him, he is old school.”
The gunman was finally caught after two police officers trailed him to a cul-de-sac and pinned him face-down. A dozen armed cops arrived minutes later.
Sources said that Jo had been targeted on two separate occasions in the months before her murder but insisted they were not linked to her killing.
'There was blood everywhere' Horrific eyewitness accounts of Labour MP Jo Cox’s murder
Horrifying eyewitness accounts have emerged describing the moment Labour MP Jo Cox was brutally murdered by a loner gunman.
The mum of two was shot and repeatedly stabbed “with a foot long knife” in broad daylight this afternoon as dozens of shocked locals looked on.
Eyewitness, Clarke Rothwell who runs a nearby cafe, told the BBC he believed the MP had been shot and stabbed multiple times.
"Three times she was shot, the initial time which then she dropped to the floor and two more times. The third time he got close proximity he shot her round the head area,” he said.
"In the meantime he was stabbing her as well, he was stabbing her with his knife,” he added.
Mr Rothwell said there was blood everywhere at the scene.
Asked if he thought Ms Cox had intervened in a dispute he said he understood the altercation was "always between the guy carrying the gun and the lady that got shot".
Aamir Tahir, of The Dry Clean Centre, said the gunman was heard shouting "Britain first".
He said: "The lady I work with heard two loud bangs but I wasn't there, I was stuck in traffic at the time. I wish I was there because I would have tried to stop him. The whole street thinks it was me but it wasn't.
"Apparently the guy who did it shouted 'Britain first' and if I had been there I would have tackled him."
Another witness has described the aftermath of the shooting to the Mirror.
Amanda Barber, 38, from Birstall, said: "I noticed something different straight away – there were a lot of people running about and cars stopped.
There was a lady laying on the floor beside a car outside the library with people all around her.
"At one point a woman shouted ‘oh my god, she’s stopped breathing’.
"She wasn’t moving – she was laid down and unconscious, no movement or anything.
"There was a female officer trying to do CPR on her as I left."
She added: "I’ve lived here my entire life and I’ve never personally seen or heard anything like this before."
A third eyewitness has described how the gunman shot Ms Cox "once" then "again" and "once more".
"He shot her once, then shot her again...shot her once more," they told the BBC.
She received a text message and a letter, both with sexual overtones, and reported them to cops. One man was cautioned for sending a malicious communication.
Hightown Primary School in Liversedge, West Yorks, which Jo had visited in the hours before her murder, yesterday told how she answered kids questions.
Everything we know about alleged killer Tommy Mair
Tommy Mair, 52, was detained by police near his home in Birstall, near Batley in West Yorkshire.
He is currently being held in police custody while officers search his home.
Mair has been described as a "loner" with mental health issues.
He is said to suffer from obsessive compulsive disorder.
The 52-year-old has long-term links with a hard-right group based in London.
He has been named as a supporter of an organisation which has defended the white supremacist apartheid regime in South Africa.
He bought bought a book from a neo-Nazi group detailing how to build your own gun and all about using chemicals and explosives.
But his brother said "he wouldn't hurt a fly".
Scott Mair said his brother is "not even political".
There had been reports the gunman shouted Britain first, but the witness has today denied ever saying that
Headteacher Russell Ingleby said: “Jo answered a range of questions with her characteristic warmth and humour and made a big impression on staff and children.
“We were shocked to hear the tragic news of Jo’s untimely death.”
A GoFundMe page set up in her memory had last night raised at least £135,000 for charities close to her heart.
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