Operation Stable Door: Triple Shooting in Stoke Newington

Gosh darn it – it’s just so hard to keep up with all the murders and attempted murders in Stoke Newington these days.

I can’t believe this passed me by:

Shocked community leaders believe last month’s triple-shooting of three teenagers has set a precedent and are calling for improved security measures in the area.

The ‘ride-by’ shooting of Kieon Barker, 15, and two other 14 year-old boys on Howard Road, Clissold, is the first ever on the estate, but it has changed the state of play, according to Keith Johnson of Milton Gardens Tenants’ and Residents’ Association.

Youth workers and residents agreed at a community action meeting that CCTV, metal detector wands and better lighting are now necessary to stop further attacks in and around Milton Gardens Estate.

“The premises do need to be upgraded now,” said Johnson. “They [the shooters] are acting as random as you like so you do have to take precautions and do have to take into account the safety of the young people.

“It might sound a bit extreme, but in my opinion it’s necessary, it’s for the safety of the young people as well as the people working with them and the residents,” said Johnson.

A worker at the Crib youth project, which works with 13-19 year olds in the area, said, “I walk that way with my daughter to the bus stop when I finish work. We could have easily been walking in that direction, so it isn’t just the kids it affects, it’s everybody.

“Judging by the way it’s being dealt with, it could happen again, because there’s nothing stopping them. You have to put things in action to stop these things happening,” she said.

Councillor Karen Alcock said, “Milton Gardens is a good estate. It’s had one shooting in the eight years I’ve been a councillor; it’s not a bad estate. It’s a good place to bring up children, and there are a lot of happy families on that estate.”

“I’d hope it will never happen again and I’m sure the police and the Crib and the community will make sure it doesn’t,” she said.

But Johnson said the atmosphere has darkened. “The young people have witnessed three of their friends being gunned down and bloodied in the street,” he said. “I think it hit home for them, and the residents, that the area is a bit more dangerous than they thought it was.”

At a Clissold Safer Neighbourhood Meeting on 11 October, Sergeant Sue Wright said that the shooting is being investigated ‘robustly’ by a team from the police’s gun crime unit, Operation Trident.

All three victims have been discharged from hospital. Source

Tom, Lizzie, your thoughts? We already know Jules Pipe’s response: “Dial 999“.

Another Stoke Newington Murder

I was out trying to post a letter when I saw the police tape. Another day, another teen-aged hit in Stoke Newington.

A nice young lady with a microphone asked me about kids in this area. I said I’d never raise any here.

Why would I? All the little fuckers round here think they’re Scarface.

UPDATE
The victim’s name was Michael McCarthy and two suspects have been charged with his murder.

If I hear the “Police are institutionally racist” one more time today, I think I’m gonna scream

Right, I get off the bus today and see two cops with a young black man who they need to speak to.

Enter, stage left, (exiting the bus just like me) two black men and a woman who may have been their mother.

Mom said, “they’re looking for a black man”

One of the men said, “I thought they were coming after me”.

I turned around and said, “ohh, what a relief, I thought they were after me”.

Unimpressed, the trio turned around to approach the police who were having an unremarkable chat with the young man. I’m sure it’s always helpful to have the uninformed question your every move as you try to do your job.

That brings me to this little gem

A Metropolitan police officer was found not guilty today of racially abusing two teenagers.

PC Mark Jones, 42, a member of the force’s Territorial Support Group, was accused of subjecting the youths to a physical and verbal attack while on patrol in a marked police van in west London in June 2007.

It was alleged that during the incident he accused one 16-year-old Kuwaiti of “robbing people while British soldiers are getting killed in Iraq”.

But Jones denied any wrongdoing in connection with the incident and the jury of five men and seven women at Kingston crown court cleared him of two charges of racially aggravated common assault following the three-week trial.

Jones and four colleagues, PC Neil Brown, 33, Sergeant William Wilson, 52, PC Steven White, 31, and PC Giles Kitchener, 31, who stood trial alongside him, were also found not guilty of misfeasance in public office.

The jury spent five hours deliberating before clearing all the officers.

None of the officers showed any emotion as the verdicts were read out.

During the trial, the court heard the officer was travelling with colleagues from London’s Paddington Green police station to patrol Lambeth during the evening rush hour when officers spotted a group of youths allegedly mouthing obscenities at them.

When they came to a stop, three teenagers were allegedly taken into the van one by one and subjected to taunts.

“Whistle blower” PC Amechi Onwugbonu, who had been in the van, gave evidence against Jones during the trial.

He said the officer swore at one teenager, Omar Mohidin, who was 16 at the time, before kicking him off the carrier.

He accused him of walking over another youth, Ahmed Hegazy, when he lay handcuffed on the floor of the vehicle.

He said a third teenager, Basil Khan, was brought onto the van before he was sworn at, punched, kneed and slapped in the face.

But Jones consistently denied acting in an unprofessional manner and PC Onwugbonu later admitted that he and Jones were “not best buddies”.

To PC Onwugbonu and the three jackasses at the bus stop today, I salute you for doing your bit to foster good race relations with your utterly spurious accusations.

I suggest the Metropolitan Police kit every officer with a San Jose “ear video camera” and bring an end to this bullshit.

To Be A Gay Man In Hackney These Days

Maybe isn’t as bad as being a lesbian in South Africa – where “raping women straight” appears to be the accepted view -

But you’re likely to get your ass kicked outside the George & Dragon.

The Guardian reports:

We’re in the midst of a new wave of anti-gay hate crimes.

No shit. Hummm, and who might the perpetrators be?

Internet chatter has increasingly discussed that such increases in homophobic hate crime is the result of the failure of multi-cultural policies to address the widening gulf between the views of new citizens from countries where homosexuality is seen as morally wrong and those UK citizens who don’t. Comments posted invariably state that most perpetrators of homophobia have been either of black or Asian origin. Many site the growth of Islam and religious fundamentalism as being a catalyst for such problems.
source

Once again, I thank Labour for their cultural relativism – my rights (erm, the right to walk down the street minding my own business without getting my head kicked in) have been sold down the river to pander to other cultural points of view.

Come on, Guardian. It’s time to tell the whole truth.

And for all you squriming relativists – here is an excellent op-ed by Antonia Senior:

The logical flaws are also obvious. Take female genital mutilation. I think it is an abhorrent, evil crime. Yet the woman slicing out the clitoris of a child with a rusty knife thinks she is doing the right thing. Clearly, one of us is absolutely right and one of us is deluded. If your culture believes in genital mutilation and mine does not, then my culture is right and good and yours is wrong and bad.

This is an argument made persuasively by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the former Dutch MP and political activist. Ali argues that Western feminists retreat into silence when faced with the subjugation of their Islamic sisters, hobbled by their unwillingness to criticise other cultures.

Sing it, sister.

You’re Not Welcome In The Borough, Dude

Thanks to the Hackney Gazette for letting us know what Hackney Labour are doing to keep Tim Larkin, a self-defence guru out of this borough:

Cllr Patrick Vernon, of Queensbridge ward, said Larkin was not welcome in the borough.

He said: “This training simply glorifies violence and is purely a money-making exercise targeting vulnerable people or exacerbating fragile relationships with the gangs and postcode turf wars locally.”

Darell Philip, a communications officer with the Hackney Seventh Day Adventist Church in Haggerston Road, said: “This training provides no solutions to the root cause of violence, but just puts young people’s lives at more risk.

” “Our message was that they should put down the guns and knives and treasure their life and their community. How can this be achieved by promoting combat violence techniques?”

Larkin, from Las Vegas, California, has more than 20 years’ experience training members of the US Navy Seals, FBI and US marshals.

Erm, while Cllr Patrick Vernon is playing Sheriff of Tombstone, perhaps he’ll have a word with the gauntlet of scrotes on the High Street and outside Nandos and tell them to clear off as well.

And to Darell Philip, “a communications officer with the Hackney Seventh Day Adventist Church in Haggerston Road”, I don’t think I’d have the luxury of  giving much thought to the “root causes of crime” if someone had their hand around my throat and was going to rape me; I’d like to know how to save my life and get out of the situation.

What would Patrick Vernon and Darell like me to do – roll over and die?

Don’t answer that.

oh shit – better ban these guys too.

Wednesday’s Hero

While having no connection to Stoke Newington I am aware of, I nevertheless am moved to give major props to Mohammad Sohail of Long Island, New York.

And what has Mohammad done to warrant a mention in Dispatches on this side of the pond?

In an amazing act of compassion and forgiveness, bodega owner Mohammad “Mo” Sohail first disarmed a would-be assailant who came into his Shirley shop — and then gave him $40 and a loaf of bread.

Peace through strength. Way to go, Mo.

Anjem and Me

London’s favourite islamist, Anjem Choudary, was hanging down at Dalston’s [in]famous Kingsland Shopping Centre today.

While I didn’t get a pic of the man himself, I did get some snaps of his death cult followers and have posted them on TwitPic for your information.

Most notable was the ocassional frission between the black Christians and the islamists. This encounter was fairly tame; although I did see it kick off a bit between the sides, I didn’t think it prudent to be taking obvious pics of the handbags.

Quote of the Day: “Jesus was a muslim“.

What Better Protects the Right to Life?

Our learned friends at the Foreign Office have told the Royal Navy not to return Somali pirates to Somalia as said pirates may face sharia law justice and punishments.

Why oh why is the torture, possible or real, of a foreign criminal in his home country MY problem? I can understand this country’s European obligations but why is the FBI preparing a case against the world’s luckiest pirate, possibly to be heard in the USA?

Perhaps it’s time to have a shift from the post WWII “rights based” paradigm.  I really don’t fancy a compo payout to yet another islamist jackass because “his Article 3 & 6 rights” may be violated, particularly when said jackass seeks to import his terror from a foreign country.

I prefer a “liberty” based paradigm, where we send foreign criminals to their homes; and a recognition that the only thing standing between me and the terrorists, protecting my liberty, my right to life, are the SAS/US Navy SEALS – not the lawyers and certainly not the Human Rights Act.

Sum, Sum, Summer, Summer Murder

PC Bitseach and I were passing the Auld Shillelagh the other day when she noted that the the murderer of the kid who died there just got 26 years.

I told her, no, that was another kid who also got murdered in a drive-by, but up the road.

This video of Paper Planes pisses me off. M.I.A. should stop bullshitting that this song is about the heartache of making sandwiches for a living. It’s about children aspiring to be Scarface.

I would therefore urge my gentle readers to just listen rather than watch. It’s a disturbing yet compelling explanation of the “senseless” murder of young people, by young people, in Stoke Newington.

Christmas 2008

This snap was taken on the walk home from midnight mass at St Mary’s (the “new” church) on Stoke Newington Church Street.

It’s nights like this where one really appreciates Stoke Newington’s village-ness. All the people in the photo are walking home from the church service. There will be more later, breathing community life into the street, from the Rose & Crown Christmas Eve lock in.

Later this morning, Clissold Park will be busy with kids riding their new bikes and later today, the Rose & Crown will be packed with friends having a pre-Christmas lunch drink.

I’ll be missing out a bit on my usual Stoke Newington Christmas as I am meeting friends at the Victory. Maybe we should do a fly-by of the Punchbowl too.

UPDATE

LOL. You’ll never guess who I saw at the Victory, yes – The Victory, for lunch today. Too bad I wasn’t sat at his table. I might of asked him about his latest suspension / compo claim over a chipolata.

All I want to know is which member of the Armed Forces invited that asshat.

Speaking of delusional whack-jobs with a persecution complex, wot in the world is Channel 4 thinking of by inviting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to give it’s “alternative Christmas speech“. I suppose if it were WWII, these idiots would be giving equal time to Lord Haw Haw.

The Queen’s Christmas Message here.