Exclusive interview with Wigan dad two years on from an horrific shotgun attack that all but blew his leg off

Almost two years have gone by since Keiron Allen was gunned down by two masked men in the garden of his sister’s home in Crabtree Road, Worsley Hall.

The shotgun blast all but tore his left leg off at the knee and doctors later brought him back from the dead on the operating table as he suffered catastrophic blood loss and cardiac arrest.

But amazing reconstructive surgery and a grim determination to fight through the pain barrier has got the 36-year-old father of six walking again.

A man was arrested on suspicion of former builder and labourer Keiron’s murder but no charges have since been brought.

The terrifying events of Saturday June 19 2021 – Father’s Day – remain a blur to the victim, with many details since provided to him by witnesses.

He had just returned from a trip to Wales with his then girlfriend and admits that he went to Worsley Hall to buy some cannabis.

It was at about 8.30pm, while the two of them were standing in his sister’s garden waiting to be picked up by a taxi that the shooting took place.

Keiron said: “This bang came out of nowhere and then it was if a metal bar had been driven through my leg. I cannot explain the pain.

"The lower half of my leg was virtually hanging off by a main tendon and a vein. The blast had gone through the middle of my leg – the police later told me it was like a ‘Liverpool kneecapping punishment.’

"I don’t remember the gunmen but apparently there was a stocky one and a taller on and they were both wearing ski masks.

"The stocky one said ‘he’s there, do him’ or something like that and the taller one fired the gun. Someone said it was aimed at my girlfriend but it hit me. They weren’t professionals. But I’ve know idea who they were and why they attacked me.

"They had to have mistaken me for someone else – I am not a criminal. I was only there for a bit of weed. One was said to have a Skelmersdale or Liverpool accent.

"As soon as they fired the shot they must have run off .

"I was hopping on one leg with blood splurting out of the other one. I knew something bad had happened. I fell to the ground and landed on the femur on my shot leg and that then shattered.

"I tried dragging myself along the garden path for three or four metres but then the adrenaline ebbed away and I must have passed out. Someone then dragged me inside my sister’s house.”

Keiron says that a rapid response paramedic was very quickly on the scene, saying that if they hadn’t arrived so soon, he would probably not be here now to tell the tale.

The North West air ambulance airlifted the stricken victim to Aintree University Hospital where he immediately underwent life-saving, emergency surgery.

Keiron was told later that doctors at one point considered waking him up to tell him that they were going to have to amputate his lower left leg because blood supply to his foot had been cut off for an hour or more.

But they then managed to get a vein from his other leg to restore circulation and so the limb was saved. There was also much stitching and stapling of muscle, skin and tissue.

Two other reconstructive operations would then follow including the implanting of a metal kneecap which was attached to surviving bone on either side.

He remembers that at one point his leg was fixed with no fewer than 600 staples.

After six weeks at Aintree, during which time he said he received no visitors, he discharged himself against doctors’ advice, telling them he was going stir crazy, feared for his safety and that he needed to get home to play with his xBox and endure the pain that way instead. He admits since that he was delirius from medication and should probably have stayed longer.

Keiron did take part in physiotherapy sessions after leaving hospital but eventually he shunned it, saying he felt he was wasting the experts’ time as it was not going well.

Months on though he realised that he had to do something about his immobility.

Keiron said: “I went on the internet and taught myself to walk again. I did exercises and gradually transferred weight from my right leg, which had been taking all the strain for so long, onto my left and was eventually able to get rid of my crutches which had been my best friends for so long.

"Christmas Day just gone was a landmark too because that was the first time I was able to tie my own shoelaces again since I’d been shot.”

As far as his assailants are concerned, a 30-year-old man was arrested in September 2021 on suspicion of Keiron’s attempted murder and a woman on suspicion of firearms offences, but eventually the police released them, telling them they would take no further action due to lack of evidence.

There have been no further arrests since.

Keiron said: “The people who did this need to be brought to justice. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"I can’t believe that no-one has CCTV or witness information that could solve this case.

"And what’s to stop the same people doing this again – or worse – to someone else?”

And for the future: “I have had mental health problems for years that everyone ignored. Now that I’ve been shot perhaps people finally will.

"I certainly need to get out of this PTSD rut.

"I think I will struggle to do physical work, at least for now, but I would like to do volunteering, maybe helping other victims of crime.

"I’d also like to thank the medical staff who saved me. But I’d like to think my UFC fighter spirit has got me through this too.”

A spokesperson for Greater Manchester Police said that the investigation into the attack was continuing.

They added: “There may have been people at the time who were unwilling to come forward but feel more comfortable to do so now.

"This was a very serious incident and we are very keen to solve the crime.”

Anyone with information is asked to ring police on 101 or call the freephone Crimestoppers line on 0800 555111.