Beyond Kennington: A roundup of rioting

A quick roundup for posterity.... This morning, I along with hosts of other Londoners, are rubbing bleary eyes and wondering how to make sense of it all. Kennington was mostly clear of violence, but due to the difficulty of accurately naming places in London, you'd not have believed it from reading Twitter.

A cleanup of Walworth Road is being organised (is underway), although one report suggests there's not as much to do as was previously imagined.  If you're nearer somewhere else and you have some free time, you can take a look at your nearest cleanup from the cleanup map here.

I was first aware of trouble last night when I was driving through the Walworth area at approximately 18:55.  As I pulled out of Manor Place and into Browning Street, I saw hordes of people running north up Walworth Road towards Elephant and then more scared people running up Browning Street.  I turned the car around further up the steet as I was trying to get down Walworth Road, only to see the flimsy orange police barrier knocked to the ground, and a number of police on Walworth Road milling around.  I decided not to stay around and gawk so I have no photos, and I headed back to SE11.

I spent much of last night on Twitter, trying to establish where/if we had any trouble spots.  The problem with Twitter is that completely untrue rumours spread very quickly, so much time was spent reassuring people that there were no real problems in Kennington.  On the whole, that's correct, although there's an area to the east of Kennington tube station slightly south of Walworth Road which some people call Kennington.  I've no idea what it's called, but some trouble over there gave the impression that we were over-run with rioters, when that was not the case.

After I returned home, the first Tweet I saw at 19:13 was:

At 19:32, @meccleshall Tweeted from Tesco on Kennington Lane to say that it was closing early and that shoppers had been asked to pay and leave.  At 19:33, @Nooskibooski noted that they'd seen two masked teenagers loading a TV into a black BMW in Kennington, but I was unable to discover which road. 

At 19:47, we saw a worrying Tweet about youths with ammunition in Kennington, but you'll note they were headed to Walworth Road, so can only assume that this was east of Kennington tube station.  Nobody else corroborated:

At 19:49, somebody Tweeted to say that Argos in Kennington was being looted.  I informed them that there was no Argos in Kennington, but from that we assumed that the Argos in Walworth Road was being raided.  Of course, that and other Tweets just sparked off more tweets about trouble in Kennington which various people disputed.  Kennington Park Road (A3) was said to be running smoothly with no traffic or queues.

At 20:06, we learned that "they" were now in Kennington, but since I couldn't get information on any given road, it was unclear to discern precisely where.  However, some Tweets at 20:07 and 20:10 re. Kennington tube station cleared up any misunderstanding.  I can only presume that trouble briefly escaped into Kennington Park Road because these were the only tweets about any issues escaping from Southwark over the Lambeth border (in Kennington) all night.  I retweeted to say that the tube station was closed:

But at 20:18, @Slicktony3000 (who was very helpful with information last night) reassured everybody that the only people he could see on Kennington Park Road were joggers!  So you can see that it was very difficult to determine whether any trouble was occurring at all (in the meantime, lots of panicky Tweets were all saying that trouble had reached Kennington).

At 20:31, after my request that people specify road names when they claimed problems in Kenington, @acediscovery said it was quiet in Alberta Street (just north of Kennington tube).  But at exactly the same time, @MsWildThyme tweeted to say that 8 riot vans and black armoured vehicles had been seen headed down Penton Place.  Other than that, it was quiet around the Pullens Estate.

I believe that's probably what generated these somewhat bizarre videos of riot vans on Walworth Road.  What on earth were they doing??

Another video was available here with some very scary screaming.  The video looked as though it had been taken from within the riot, with a voice asking the officers to "please calm down".  Unsurprisingly, it has now been removed. 

I kept Tweeting that we were experiencing no issues in Kennington, and that problems were acknowledged in Walworth Road when I caught a Tweet saying a stabbing had been reported on Kennington Park Road.  This turned out to be untrue and unfounded.  At 20:39, @msraddi said that riot police were running down Manor Place.  More messages were received to say that Kennington Cross, Kennington Road and Kennington Lane were fine (as they were all night).

At 21:11, @gilboise tweeted to say that Kennington tube was open, but at 21:13, @igster noted "kids in hoodies" screaming past Kennington tube.  At 21:34, @TheRealJimShady said that he'd driven from Clapham South to Kennington and noted no problems.  Was just breathing a sigh of relief, and wondering if there was time to take a break for dinner when alarming reports of a shooting appeared at 21:41:

Established that an exchange of gunfire was taking place somewhere on the Alberta Estate.  Various Tweets were flying around which generally corroborated problems in the area.  At 22:18, @Deskibel said a friend had heard gunshots on or around Alberta Street.

At 22:26, the Guardian issued more detailed reports about what had happened on Walworth Road.

At 22:54, Cllr Mark Harrison (@SE11) Tweeted that we should strongly support our emergency services at times like this.  I agreed, and re-tweeted. @Uber0ut noted that pedestrians were back on Walworth Road.  From there on in, we started to hear reports that Walworth Road had been entirely trashed.  Tweets came in suggesting that both Stockwell and Camberwell had escaped any trouble bar an attempted-car jack on Coldharbour Lane.  (Although this may nto be true because there appears to be a cleanup taking place in Camberwell this morning).  At 23:27, @JustinPDJ reported large numbers of police headed from Kennington towards Clapham (the rest we know about from the TV).  For the rest of the night, Kennington (which houses large numbers of police buildings and vehicles) was sirens as usual.

At 00:14, BT issued a Tweet only to call 999 in an absolute emergency due to immense pressure on the number.  We learned that a few riot police were guarding the remains of the looted shops in Walworth Road. 

Finally, I received alarming reports at about 01:02 from @SW8guy and @CarolineFW that there was a fire at Southbank club on Wandsworth Road.  There was a lot of smoke, but no flames visible.  The Fire Brigade were able to bring it under control. 

Merry Christmas

I wish a Merry Christmas to all readers of the Lurking about SE11 blog. We have the following local good news stories in honour of Christmas:

Here's a great story from the Telegraph about a one 100 year old lady, originally born in Kennington.

There's an alarming story here of a Pest Control officer who discovered a 2 ft crocodile in a house in Peckham!

There's a bright story about the father in Walworth who has decorated his estate with Christmas lights to celebrate his son's recovery from leukaemia.

Ezekiel Adeboyego Ojo murder in Penrose Street

In the early hours of Friday 23rd August, Ezekiel Adeboyego Ojo was found with head injuries on Penrose Street (just off the Walworth Road, SE17) from several gun shot wounds. He died soon after. He was only 24 years old. Operation Trident are investigating the incident.

Penrose Street is not unknown to police. Unbelievably, the main police station for the area is on Manor Place, which is only two streets away. I sometimes wonder whether police turn a blind eye to crime that occurs immediately upon their patch. I don't think I blogged about it, but earlier this year on June 21st, two young boys were stabbed in Penrose Street (both are ok). Indeed, in the same article, it is noted that "The boys were attacked in a London borough being targeted by the Met as a knife crime hotspot with dozens of extra patrols and "stop-and-searches" of anyone suspected of carrying a weapon."

It appears that we don't need a Metropolitan Police Crime Map to tell us anything at all.

I know I'm probably last on the news front with this one as I haven't been near a computer since late last Thursday, but still, another shooting... In how many weeks?

Ashley Bucknor remanded for Walworth Road shooting

The Press Association reported on Sunday that a 19 year old man named Ashley Bucknor was remanded in custody for Ryan Bravo's murder on Walworth Road in SE17, which I reported previously here.

Walworth Road shooting - atrocious reporting by Daily Mail

You may have noticed yesterday that in my first post about the shooting on the Walworth Road that I quoted several sources; BBC News, Sky News and the Daily Mail. I included a brief excerpt and link to the Daily Mail, without saying much, and indicated that they are not my preferred source. It appears that the first Daily Mail report has vanished... However, I did manage to find a Google cache of it here. The report that replaces it with the "innocent victim" remarks can be found here.

What's so interesting about the report's disappearance is the way that the initial report was entirely inaccurate. The first report rather implied that Ryan Bravo was a member of a gang and that he entered a rival gang's territory. I'll quote from it furthur down. You'll notice in my posts that I never speak of race/colour unless they're in some way pertinent to the story in question. eg. I might report on the "Black LGBT Pride march", but I wouldn't report, "Leeona Smith, a black woman from Vauxhall won an award". I don't see race as particularly useful data in relation to a killing/award ceremony etc. Although, I have to confess that I /do/ want to be told about instances of racial discrimination, so there's a careful line to be trod. However, there are rarely reports that state, "Lots of white traders have manipulated the market and caused huge losses".

But, despite it's political incorrectness so to do, I want to raise the question of whether the Mail would have posted its initial story if the victim had not been black. The initial report didn't mention that the victim was any particular colour (although they did mention the colour of the moped riders), but I just think that the inaccurate report reflects the Daily Mail middle-england bias of the kind of story they'd /like/ to report on from South London, irrespective of its veracity. If I were the parent/friend/partner of Ryan, I'd sue them for serious inaccuracy. Of course, I caught the online version very quickly, and don't know if it ever went to print...

So, let's look at some of the discrepancies:

Report 1:

"One man, who asked not to be named, said the youth had deliberately crossed into a rival gang's area as an act of bravado.

'If you cross over you are going to make sure everyone knows about it. It was a statement,' he said.

'He wanted to be a big man. That is why it happened. It is a gang zone around here. He is from the wrong side and came down here trying to act the big man." ...

'I have known him for years, ever since he was a kid. He did not go to school, he was in a gang.'"

versus

Report 2:

"The teenager shot dead at a supermarket in London was the innocent victim of a dispute between two street gangs, it has emerged.

College student Ryan Bravo, 18, was caught in the line of fire as two or more gunmen tried to shoot the two youths after they strayed into the wrong territory."

In report 1, the police are quoted:

"Police sources said the victim was not a major gang figure. 'He is not known to Trident - he is not a major player. That does not mean he wasn't involved in more petty postcode rivalries.'"

It seems to me that saying somebody is "not a major gang figure" rather implies that they might be a minor figure! Luckily, that's all sorted out later...

Report 2:

A local resident said: 'He was a good boy. I didn't ever know him to get into any trouble.

'My son and him were always talking and laughing together. As my son would say, he was a gentleman – he didn't have any "street name" or anything like that.'

How is it in any way acceptable to publish a report that is later found to be almsot entirely inaccurate? Does this happen often?

Update on Walworth Road Shooting

Furthur to my earlier post about the Walworth Road shooting (and one reason not to trust the Daily Mail) is that the male, now named as Ryan Bravo, has been revealed to be an innocent bystander, shot in the back during gunfire between local gangs. Some reports are saying the incident took place on Camberwell Road, but it appeared to happen at the point of the road just where Camberwell Road becomes Walworth Road.

The Telegraph reports that police suspect the shooting might be linked to an incident in Myatts Field earlier the same day.

Anybody who has furthur information relating to those involved in the incident has been asked to contact the police's Operation Trident.

Walworth Road Shooting in Costcutter

I've just seen the BBC news and Sky News of a shooting yesterday just outside the SE11 area in the Walworth Road (SE17).

From the brief details available, the killing took place in Costcutter. The victim was aged 18 and male. He is the 22nd victim to die in London this year from shooting or stabbing.

The Daily Mail (not a preferred source) states:

Onlookers said the shooting at 9.45pm yesterday was gang related and part of a vicious "postcode warfare".

I'm posting this because I want everybody to keep noticing that our young people are killing each other. It can't be written off as just "gang related" killing as though that either explains sufficiently or justifies in any way. A death should not become just another statistic.

I'll post more news as it becomes available.

My thoughts and prayers are with the family of this young man.