500 knives were seized during Scotland Yard’s Operation Blunt
Adam Fresco, Crime Correspondent
In May the Metropolitan Police launched the high-profile Operation Blunt 2 – involving taking airport style metal detectors onto the streets and instituting Section 60 powers, allowing officers to search youths
Knife crime ‘overtakes terrorism as top priority for Met’
Knife crime has overtaken terrorism as the top priority for the Metropolitan Police as one of Britain’s most senior officers admitted that the fight to stop teenagers carrying weapons was not working.
Deputy Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson said today that the battle against knife crime has become “the No 1 priority” for the Met as the 18th teenager to die a violent death in the capital this year was named.
To try and stem the rising tide of young deaths he has ordered all senior officers to look at their current operations and see if any personnel can be diverted to help tackle the rise in stabbings.
In May the Metropolitan Police launched the high-profile Operation Blunt 2 – involving taking airport style metal detectors onto the streets and instituting Section 60 powers, allowing officers to search youths within a certain geographical area.
Despite 27,000 people being searched, 1,200 arrested and 500 knives seized with 95 per cent of people arrested being charged schoolchildren are still being murdered.
On Sunday Ben Kinsella died after being knifed “numerous” times after apparently getting caught up in an argument that spilled out of a pub in Islington, north London.
The latest teenage victim, Shakilus Townsend, 16, asked for his mother and said “I don’t want to die” as he lay bleeding in a street in Thornton Heath, south London on Thursday, a witness said.
He was attacked by a gang just before 2pm in what a senior detective described as “another senseless incident in which a young life has been taken away by a knife”.
He died in St George’s Hospital, Tooting, south London, just after midnight, the 18th teenager to meet a violent death in London this year.
Earlier this year Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said that “there is no bigger challenge or threat to the whole of London, perhaps with the exception of terrorism, than youth violence”.
But it seems youth crime has now risen to the top.
Speaking at a Metropolitan Police Association Co-ordination and Policing Committee meeting this morning, Mr Stephenson said: “Clearly this message is not getting through.”
0 responses so far ↓
There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.