People in Devizes have spoken of their shock at the death of stab victim Matthew Baggott.

Kennet District Council chairman Paula Winchcombe, lead councillor on community safety, said: "This is a terrible tragedy and people are still terribly shocked by it.

"My sympathy goes out to Mr Baggott's family. The police seem to have acted very quickly and maintained a high visibility presence."

Other civic figures have spoken of their shock and sorrow on hearing of the tragic events of last Thursday.

Town mayor, Coun Julian Beinhorn, said: "This is a very sad tragedy for Devizes and our hearts go out to the family and friends of Mr Baggott.

"It is rewarding to hear that the police acted so quickly.

"There has been a good police presence over the weekend to reassure people. It saddens me that a small town like Devizes is now seeing the violence normally associated with big towns and cities."

Coun Beinhorn was among the local stakeholders briefed by police at a special meeting last Friday.

Andrew Maclachlan, who runs the Bear Hotel with his wife Angela, is chairman of the community safety group on the Devizes Community Area Planning Partnership.

He spoke of the events of both last Thursday and Sunday. He said: "These are things we don't like happening in our little town and it is unfortunate we have had two such events so close together.

"The public needs reassuring that crime is actually coming down in the area and these kind of things are very rare."

Supt Paul Williams said both this and the raid at the Total garage in Northgate Street on Sunday, in which a worker was held at knifepoint, were totally uncharacteristic.

He said: "Knife crime is relatively rare in Wiltshire and almost unheard of in Devizes. Here we have two incidents in which people from outside the town have come in and brought knives with them.

"If we thought knives were becoming a problem the Government has given us the powers to stop and search people we suspect of carrying them.

"But these powers must be used proportionately."

Peter Lay, who has stood down as chairman of Devizes Development Partnership but is still on the management committee, said the town's CCTV system, which comes on line in November, would have been of value in similar incidents.

He said: "This is a dreadfully sad occurrence but clearly CCTV would have been of use. In this case the alleged perpetrator was caught very quickly.

"But had circumstances been different the offence would have been caught on camera or valuable evidence could have been gathered."

Read all our stabbing coverage