London burning: locals report on youth violence

By Melanie Henderson.-

BuenosAiresHerald.com Staff

Mixed feelings of fear, anger, doubt and confusion cloud the air in London, as the escalated looting, pillaging and violence pursued on the streets for the third day. Five locals share their experiences.

The events came as a surprise to UK residents, as unrest plagued different parts of London and other UK cities since last Saturday night, with whole town centres being vandalized, shops being looted, buildings and vehicles set alight and blown up, police officers attacked; to violent tension between the rioters themselves.

British Prime Minister David Cameron –recently returned from holiday- spoke today to try to control the situation, condemning “the sickening scenes of crime,” deeming the incidents to be acts of “criminality, pure and simple that need to be confronted and dealt with immediately.”

The police labelled the chain reaction crimes as ‘copycat criminal activity,’ as they began to change tactics and prepare to fill the crime-affected areas with more officers, in a bid to gain control over a situation they were not necessarily prepared for, which, up to date has seen 111 police officers injured, 563 arrests and 105 people charged over the conflicts.

Nationwide security alerts were being raised with police out in force across London, Birmingham, and other large cities and smaller towns affected by the crimes.

Ahead of what will be the fourth night of unrest in England’s capital buenosairesherald.com spoke with local residents from different parts of London, in affected and non-affected areas to try to grasp what’s really happening on the streets.

Andrew Negus, a 27 year-old geologist who lives in Dalston, East London and works in the Brick Lane area, described his experiences over recent days.

“The situation is real, and pretty bad,” mentioned Negus, who experienced some of the events firsthand, as riots were taking place just 1000 metres away from his house.

He explained that in his local neighbourhood -which is not far from the harder-hit area of Hackney- members of the local Turkish community guarded their shops along Kingsland High Street overnight as a measure of protection against looters. “Three to four people were guarding each shop last night,” he said.

“50 young Pakistani youths aged between 16-25, storming the streets, burning cars in their path – to which four riot police vans came to control, but ended up staying inside their vans, having the youths smash in their windows in anger,” Negus explained. 

The attacks across the area in which he lives have mainly taken place at night-time, however some were taking place during the day yesterday. One group of around 100 youths were out on the pillage, all from different ethnic backgrounds.

Negus was forced to leave work early; meanwhile many local shops and services were also closed earlier due to fears of repeated local destruction.

Security manager, Garnett Henderson, aged 54, is in charge of a building estate in London’s financial district. He explained, “I have not been directly affected by the riots and violence, however all of London is on alert due to the incidents that have occurred.”

He further explained that “the local area has not suffered greatly; however police advised extra precautions be put in place, including increasing manpower inside buildings, and extra vigilance in the area.”

Henderson went on to explain that there was an air of tension in general, as many people’s journey’s home from work have been affected, due to some bus routes being cut off before reaching riot-affected areas, increasing local fears of attacks.

Amanda Knightley, 25, a compliance manager in the city area of Bishopsgate described her local work area to be “mildly affected,” but was more shocked about the incidents in Enfield, close to where she lives, as cars were recklessly being torched in cinema and retail car parks.

Knightley described the incidents as “senseless,” and explained that the fear people have could be justified by the fact that “no one really knows what is going on,” as many youth groups continued to cause chaos sporadically.

“Cameron has somewhat eased people’s minds, but it is still all a little unclear, as social network threats and rumours continue to circulate,” she explained.

Victoria Louise Brown, 24, who works in recruitment in the outer London area of Northampton explained that violence had even reached the suburbs.

“A car exploded today in Northampton,” she explained, furthering that it was “quite difficult to ignore the situation,” as large police vans bolted down the M1 motorway on Cameron’s order to involve more police in night-time patrolling across London.

Even though Brown, who lives in the Northern suburban area of London did not feel directly affected by the attacks, she did explain the situation as “scary” and insisted “police should be pushing to do more,” dismissing the prime minister’s late reaction to the widespread violence, in shock about the fact that there were very little police against the criminals.

Liam Harris, a 25 year-old secondary school teacher living in West Norwood, described the situation in South London- an area badly hit by the incidents.

“The local area has been affected in some parts; a young man who came into the area was shot dead,” reportedly killed for coming from another part of London.

Harris affirmed that people had a general feeling of fear and frustration, of not being able to do anything to ease tensions, or overtly help police.

“Extra security has been ordered for the local area, especially shopping centres and along high streets,” in order to prevent further looting, explained Harris.

The repercussions of these attacks are believed to be grave. Negus explained that “people fear their livelihoods being literally put up in flames,” as police were unable to tame the out-of-control youths.

“These kids have nothing to work for, and come from broken homes with poor parenting,” causing them to commit these crimes, explained Negus. “The police are acting as if this is a protest, whereas they should be getting them off the streets.”

Meanwhile, Henderson stated that “this whole situation is petty and a simple excuse to riot,” describing the children as “disadvantaged youths who now feel empowered.”

British Prime Minister has deployed 16,000 more police officials to patrol the streets of London tonight, to try to prevent further damages, while local residents hold on nervously, to see what awaits them in the morning.