Alex Beresford made an emotional return to Good Morning Britain on Wednesday morning. His appearance comes just days after his cousin was stabbed to death in a London attack. Nathan Armstrong, 29, was killed in the early hours of Saturday morning on Gowan Avenue in Fulham - the same road where broadcaster Jill Dando was shot dead in 1999. In his first interview since the horrific news, Alex opened up about his cousin and the "emotional rollercoaster" his family are going through.
© Photo: ITVAlex Beresford returned to GMB on Wednesday
"We also buried our uncle yesterday so it's been a lot of ups and downs," the weatherman told Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid. "No one would have expected it, especially after I spoke out. You couldn't make it up. It's come as a big surprise that it's happened to Nathaniel… he is 29, not in a gang, he went to a good school, university." He added: "He was a big guy. He was like 6'6, 6'7, when you spoke to him you were literally looking up. I guess on the outside some people could have been intimidated by him but he wasn't that person - everyone said he was a big friendly giant. For this to happen to him, everyone was quite shocked."
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On the irony that this crime happened just days after Alex intervened on a GMB debate about knife crime, the former Dancing On Ice star said: "It literally can happen to anybody. That's why I was saying on the show, it is about environment and not just one environment, and it's about changing everything. Poverty, we have not solved that, this is why a lot of people are finding themselves in these situations… something just needs to be done." He continued: "I can't always find the words right now. I think this happening only reaffirms what I was saying about the environment and also about prisons and that they are not always a deterrent."
Nathan was killed on Gowan Avenue in Fulham
With Nathaniel's killer still at large, Alex remarked: "We need to think about the other side of this. This person who has done this to my cousin, he has also ruined his life, the ripple effect goes wider, it affects his family as well and that'd why we need to fix this problem from both sides. That's why I have said before: 'Nobody wins, everybody loses in these situations.'" On what police have told him about the case, Alex revealed: "At the moment, we don't know a great deal… the person, we can’t find him at the moment. Nathaniel is not here to tell his side of the story. We have all seen the CCTV where they are talking, as I said, Nathaniel was more of a talker. Obviously they disappear off camera and what happened happened. As I understand it, it was a single stab wound that took his life."
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