I struggled to hold it together while watching Henry Nowak's arrest footage. It was harrowing, but we're not here to sugarcoat the truth

I was live on air for my Patrick Christys Tonight show. I'd just finished doing a relatively mundane segment about house prices falling and mortgages rising, and I exited the studio into the newsroom to ask my producer if any of tomorrow's front pages had come out yet.

There was a weird atmosphere, and everyone was huddled around a laptop in stony silence.

'They've released the Henry Nowak footage,' my producer said. I watched it during an advert break and, honestly, it made me want to put my fist through the studio wall. My instinct was: 'We have to play this out, right now, and show the world what those police officers did to Henry.'

Rightly, my producer, as is often the case, calmed me down a bit.

Firstly, we weren't sure if the footage had been released with the family's consent. Secondly, we weren't sure if it was actually appropriate to play that harrowing video out on national television - we were witnessing the moment a young man lost his life, begging for help, presumably in agony.

All of that happened in the space of a three-minute advert break - I had to go back in and do another segment about trade union members switching from supporting Labour to Reform, which, given what I'd just seen, all felt a bit pointless.

At the top of the hour, there's a longer break, and in that time, we received confirmation from the police that Henry Nowak's brave family had consented to the footage being released. It then became a purely editorial decision.

None of the other broadcasters, BBC or Sky, were playing it.

My feeling, and the feeling of those in the newsroom, was that the public has a right to know the circumstances in which Henry died. There was a public interest - in both senses of the word 'interest'.

There was also a sense that if the footage wasn't played, that the police officers involved might 'get away with it' - and I didn't think that was right. I also wanted the public to see the lies of Henry's killer, Vikram Digwa - so they could be under no illusions as to what kind of monster he really is.

We decided I would come back on air at the top of the 10pm hour and warn the public that we were going to play the footage. I would then verbally describe what I'd already seen, and warn the public again about how harrowing it is. The thinking was that it would give the viewers several minutes to decide whether or not they wanted to view it, or to get children out of the living room and away from the TV.

Once that was done, we played it. In full.

Watching it on the larger TV screen in the studio, with my panel sat next to me (none of whom had seen it already), with the sound coming out of the big speakers...to be honest, I struggled to hold it together.

Everyone in the studio was fighting back tears - but so was everyone at home. I was immediately flooded with messages on social media from people all saying the same thing: They watched it. They wanted to see it, without really wanting to see if, if that makes sense. And they were furious, upset and disgusted with both the murderer and the police.

Seeing that footage gave me even more respect for Henry's family. How could they have watched their son die like that and still conduct themselves with such grace, poise and composure both inside and outside court?

From a GB News and journalism perspective, deciding whether or not to play that footage was such a tough call. But I believe it was the right one. We're not here to sugarcoat the truth, we're here to show the public the reality of things.

I went home that night and I was still wide awake at 4am thinking about it - and I know many viewers were, because they were messaging me to say so online. They couldn't sleep either.

I hope, wherever he is, Henry Nowak realises that the entire nation feels a burning sense of injustice about what happened to him, and I hope he knows how loved he is.