A man who left an angry message on the window of a West Midlands ambulance attending a 42-year-old neighbour who later died has apologised for his "monstrous" behaviour.
Hassan Shabbir, 27, left the outrageous note - which read: "You may be saving lives but don't park in a stupid place and block my drive" - on the windscreen of the vehicle in Birmingham.
The controversy came to light after West Midlands Ambulance Service tweeted the note and staff said they were "lost for words."
East Midlands Ambulance Service said they had no reported instances of angry notes left on their vehicles.
In the Birmingham incident, it was reported that the patient, who was vomiting blood and had internal bleeding, later died at Heartlands Hospital.
Paramedic Tasha Starkey shared a picture of the note on Twitter and said: "Crew alerted an extremely poorly patient to hospital, minimal on scene time, arrived at hospital to find this note... this patient was TIME-CRITICAL."
Now, Mr Shabbir has spoken out to the Mirror - and admitted: "What I did was monstrous."
He added: "I’m ashamed that I did what I did, deeply ashamed. My heart goes out to the man that passed away.
"There’s no justification, there is no explanation, there is nothing that I can say to justify my actions.
"I would like to apologise for any offence that I have caused to the family members of the man who passed away."
An ambulance spokesman said the crew were only on the scene for 30 minutes before the patient was transported on blue lights to hospital.
The spokesman said: "Sometimes we just don’t know quite what to say.
"This was the note left on one of the ambulances today - ‘you may be saving lives but don’t park your van in a stupid place and block my drive’.
"At the time, the crew were helping a man who was extremely unwell after vomiting a lot of blood.
“They assessed his condition and immediately took him on blue lights to hospital where he was in a critical condition.
"Our staff will always try and park considerately, but sometimes, there just isn’t time. Sorry, patients come first."
Relatives of the patient, who could not be saved, have told how the note added to their grief after Friday’s tragedy.
John Hagans, a nurse consultant at Livingstone House, said the man’s father told him: "This is hard enough as it is.
"It’s been made 50 times worse knowing the note was placed on the ambulance my son was in."
The man was suffering from internal bleeding and vomiting blood when paramedics were called.
The 999 crew battled for 30 minutes at the scene to save him before he was taken to Heartlands Hospital. He later died the same day.
Crew alerted an extremely poorly patient to hospital... minimal on scene time, arrived at hospital to find this note... this patient was TIME-CRITCAL.
Mr Hagans told the Mirror: "They are absolutely horrified.
"They said it’s hard enough as it is, with the loss. He was making active changes to change his life.
"He was somebody who had made poor choices but was now making the right ones.
"I am absolutely disgusted that an individual complained about the ambulance’s parking. An ambulance is a sacred space.
"What goes on inside there, it shouldn’t be interfered with."
