By LIZ HULL, NORTHERN CORRESPONDENT
Published: 19:42 EST, 11 December 2025 | Updated: 19:42 EST, 11 December 2025
The former Royal Marine commando who injured 134 fans at Liverpool Football Club's victory parade careered into the crowd because he was likely experiencing a ‘catathymic crisis,’ a leading criminologist said today.
Professor David Wilson said the concept, coined by psychiatrists at the turn of the 20th century, explains what happens when latent or subconscious feelings bubble to the surface and overwhelm an individual, prompting them to commit what appears to be ‘inexplicable violence’.
He said he believed Paul Doyle was a ‘classic’ example of an ordinary, law-abiding family man who had suffered an 'acute catathymic crisis’ before becoming ‘incredibly remorseful when he realised what he had done'.
Doyle, 54, who is due to be sentenced on Monday, sobbed in the dock at Liverpool Crown Court last month as he pleaded guilty to dangerous driving, affray and 29 other GBH-related offences, involving 17 adults and 12 children injured in the carnage last May.
The married father-of-three claimed he was in a ‘blind panic’ and feared for his life when supporters started banging on the windows of his Ford Galaxy as he drove down a closed off street, in Liverpool city centre.
But prosecutors dismissed his account, saying dashcam footage from inside the IT consultant’s own car revealed he was angry and intended to cause fans serious harm when he ploughed into them in a rage.
Prof Wilson said there was nothing in Doyle’s background – it is not believed that he has any recent previous criminal convictions and was not high on drink or drugs – to explain what happened, but instead pointed to his military service and evidence from friends about his ‘intensely competitive’ nature as a reason for his sudden, violent behaviour.
According to Doyle’s LinkedIn page, he served as a Royal Marine for just over four years until June 1994. He passed out of the Royal Marine Commando Training Centre, also known as CTCRM, in March 1991 and served with 43 Commando, the unit based in Arbroath, Scotland, that helps secure the UK's nuclear deterrent.
Paul Doyle faces life in jail after admitting driving his car into crowds at the Liverpool victory parade
Pictured: Paul Doyle who was seen driving the car in Liverpool on May 26, 2025
Professor David Wilson (pictured) said Paul Doyle was likely experiencing a catathymic crisis when he ploughed into crowds
However, subsequent reports have suggested Doyle may have overstated his service and, in reality, left the Marines before completing his minimum service length in January 1993.
Doyle later went on to graduate from Liverpool University with a degree in psychology and maths, before working at McDonald’s and moving into IT, where his most recent roles involved working in cyber security.
‘I kept expecting that we were going to uncover things in Paul Doyle's background, that he used alcohol, that he used drugs, or aspects of his online activity which would explain his behaviour, but that hasn’t happened,’ Prof Wilson said.
‘In fact, quite the reverse. We discover that he is regarded as a good father, a good husband, a great neighbour and so forth.
‘One former IT colleague said that Paul Doyle was like a mentor to him, another said he was intensely competitive. He revealed a situation in which they had been climbing Mount Kilimanjaro to raise money for a charity and as they were coming down two people started to run ahead, so they would reach the bottom before they would.
'And (the colleague said) Paul Doyle was so intensely competitive that he wouldn’t have it, and so immediately overtook the two people running to get to the bottom before them, without breaking a sweat.’
Prof Wilson, emeritus professor at Birmingham City University, said he believed Doyle ploughed into the fans, even keeping his foot on the accelerator when people became trapped under the car’s wheels, because in that moment he was unable to ‘control’ the crowd as he had expected.
‘The prosecution’s depiction of Paul Doyle as an enraged, entitled, angry white man doesn’t really fit with the pattern of what we know about his domestic life,’ Prof Wilson added.
‘He's happily married, he's got kids, he's employed, he's regarded as a great employee.
‘There's no restraining order, there are no recent previous convictions that we know of. So, what we're trying to do is explain what appears inexplicable.
The Trial: The Liverpool Parade - Follow the case as it unfolds on this new Daily Mail podcast
Doyle was swiftly detained by police after mowing through pedestrians on May 26, 2025
Police officers investigate the scene in Water Street, following the open-top bus victory parade for Liverpool's Premier League title win
Police officers are seen covering an area with an inflatable tent to preserve evidence
‘And that's why I think the catathymic crisis, this latent issue which hasn't previously been resolved, bubbles to the surface because it finds an outlet. In that moment, that awful moment in Liverpool, Paul Doyle believes he has to take charge of the crowd.
‘He's intensely competitive and so he expects to get his own way, as he has whilst being a commando in the past.
‘What’s coming to the surface is his previous history of being in a military uniform and having to take charge, having to be the person who's telling the crowd what to do. That's the crisis for him.
‘In that moment he's dealing with unprocessed events from his past as a soldier – events that emerge within that specific event within the community, within Liverpool, where he's going to injure 134 people.’
The court is expected to hear that Doyle, who was in the city to pick up friends who had attended the parade, appeared determined to meet them in Castle Street, at the top of Water Street, even when they suggested walking elsewhere because the roads were clogged with supporters.
Prof Wilson said Doyle, a Scout leader who was also involved in his local church, would have been used to taking responsibility and ‘managing situations’ and likely viewed it as his ‘duty’ to complete his ‘mission’ to pick up his friends.
‘For me, it fitted quite perfectly with the idea of the catathymic crisis - him being competitive, a former soldier, a Scout leader, and wanting to take charge or take responsibility,’ Prof Wilson added. ‘He was going to fulfil his duty, complete his mission, if you like.’
Prof Wilson, a former prison governor who now serves as Chair of the Friends of Grendon Prison, in Buckinghamshire, said individuals who suffer a catathymic crisis are often ‘incredibly remorseful’ once they realise what they’ve done.
While he said his sympathies lie with the 134 injured, he also indicated that Doyle’s behaviour in court revealed him to be a ‘troubled’ and ‘broken’ man, who, now his crisis had subsided, realised the enormity of what he had done.
‘This is a very troubled soul,’ Prof Wilson added. ‘When one heard what was being said when he was pleading guilty, the fact he was sobbing in the dock, it’s quite clear that he is a psychologically broken man.’