Knife Crime

[megilleland]

With all the news at the moment highlighting knife crime and shootings how does it come to this? 

My theory is that organised high level crime is where it starts well before it gets to the kids on the street. I believe it is linked to illegal immigration. 

Imagine you want to get into the UK - unless you are a good swimmer or forger of documents you will be tempted to use a trafficking group who for thousands of pounds will get you across the channel. Arriving and secreted somewhere in the UK your traffickers know your illegal and say to you that in order to earn money to survive and pay them back for their services you carry drugs for them. Seems a good idea until you stray into someone else's patch. The health and safety advice is you need to protect yourself and the recommended form of defence is a knife. 

You are now have an established source of income and you like to spread the message so everyone can be enticed into have a piece of the cake. By getting children on board and setting up the county lines of distribution is when trouble at the local end begins. Kids involved talking to their friends on how easy it is to get a nice handout for introducing substances to the playground result in arguments and jealously. Jimmy Smith appears to be doing very well at the tuck shop and using a brand new smart phone in the playground. Soon our illegal immigrant is a human resources manager creating his own little empire. 

Arguments years ago at school revolved around bullying with name calling and the rare fisty cuffs when the gathered spectators would call out "fight fight", until a teacher appeared to bring the situation under control and the offenders marched off to the head teacher for a good flogging. Nowadays matters are sorted out after school hours on the street corner or in the local park with devastating consequences. No policemen to investigate who is involved, no community policemen looking after their patch, no Neighbourhood Watch operating - you are better off asking the local postman what is going on. Everyone is now on their own including the general public. 

All this can be reduced with proper border controls and we don't want the military helping out or it is going to be machine guns all round. The real problem is we have no idea who is actually here in the UK.

[megilleland]

County lines gangs: how drug-running is fuelling knife crime

The Guardian have run an article today supporting my views on knife crime, except that they don't go further up the line, where I believe it starts, with illegal immigration and open borders.

[megilleland]

Letter in Hereford Times - 12th March 2019:

Built into ordinary people (the majority of us) is a set of principles. These prevent us from committing criminal acts. We need neither fear of being caught nor of retribution as a deterrent. We acquire these principles, as well as self discipline, in childhood in a normal family. Very regrettably, our society in the last 40 years has systematically derided and attempted to destroy the normal family, advocating its replacement by a ‘menage’ of various sorts in which children grow unsupervised and with no examples set for them. We revel in the misfortune of having no father in the house, which may sometimes be chaotic and drug ridden. 

We now reap the harvest of our folly. We have managed to produce a generation including a proportion of undisciplined, selfish, knife-carrying individuals, totally lacking in self control. They will thieve, or murder as the urge takes them. More policing will help, but will not deal with the root of the problem. Nor can we expect the schools to solve this problem for us. Bring back the responsible father and mother in the home and give them the means to survive on adequate wages for a good day’s work, together with the time and space to bring up our children.

Hubert Porte

Madley

Bang on Hubert thoroughly agree.

[Roger]

On 09/03/2019 at 09:57, megilleland said:

With all the news at the moment highlighting knife crime and shootings how does it come to this? 

My theory is that organised high level crime is where it starts well before it gets to the kids on the street. I believe it is linked to illegal immigration. 

Imagine you want to get into the UK - unless you are a good swimmer or forger of documents you will be tempted to use a trafficking group who for thousands of pounds will get you across the channel. Arriving and secreted somewhere in the UK your traffickers know your illegal and say to you that in order to earn money to survive and pay them back for their services you carry drugs for them. Seems a good idea until you stray into someone else's patch. The health and safety advice is you need to protect yourself and the recommended form of defence is a knife. 

You are now have an established source of income and you like to spread the message so everyone can be enticed into have a piece of the cake. By getting children on board and setting up the county lines of distribution is when trouble at the local end begins. Kids involved talking to their friends on how easy it is to get a nice handout for introducing substances to the playground result in arguments and jealously. Jimmy Smith appears to be doing very well at the tuck shop and using a brand new smart phone in the playground. Soon our illegal immigrant is a human resources manager creating his own little empire. 

Arguments years ago at school revolved around bullying with name calling and the rare fisty cuffs when the gathered spectators would call out "fight fight", until a teacher appeared to bring the situation under control and the offenders marched off to the head teacher for a good flogging. Nowadays matters are sorted out after school hours on the street corner or in the local park with devastating consequences. No policemen to investigate who is involved, no community policemen looking after their patch, no Neighbourhood Watch operating - you are better off asking the local postman what is going on. Everyone is now on their own including the general public. 

All this can be reduced with proper border controls and we don't want the military helping out or it is going to be machine guns all round. The real problem is we have no idea who is actually here in the UK.

Your topic title is what it is. Then you mention very little about knives! There is a Policy/guidance decision, on sentencing, to be made about anyone caught in possession of a knife in criminal circumstances. A 'deterrent' sentence is required. Any current guidance is obviously not a sufficient deterrent. As people caught with knives (in garden variety circumstances) are not being locked up in a routine manner. 

[megilleland]

Its not the knives it's the morons behind them. These people need identifying. With nothing worthwhile to do with their life these individuals will always take the risks and opportunities to make a quick buck.

[Roger]

We have the highest employment rates (no surprise as the population has increased) and the lowest unemployment rates for ages. So this knife situation is existing in a sub culture. Outside of the mainstream. We've had 3 years of 'navel gazing' over 'Brexit'. We should leave with 'No Deal'. Then get onto knife crime. Obviously we then have multiple years trying to do trade with the EU whilst trying to eliminate the Elephant in the Room. Which is the Immigration/Free Movement issue. Not to be confused with someone trying to have a two week holiday outside their own Country. Or even a 4 day break. I've just been bought return flights to the EU for April. So I have to watch all this stuff! 

[megilleland]

On 20/03/2019 at 08:58, megilleland said:

Its not the knives it's the morons behind them. These people need identifying. With nothing worthwhile to do with their life these individuals will always take the risks and opportunities to make a quick buck.

In The Daily Mail - 10th April 2019

County lines drugs lord, 32, relied on three runners with a combined age of 169 to push crack cocaine and heroin worth £75,000 into quaint market towns

* Nicholas Ward ran sophisticated drugs empire from his home in West Bromwich

* He used couriers aged 61, 55, and 53 to deliver to customers across Midlands

* Ringleader jailed for nine years after police smashed the gang in a raid in 2018 

The leader of a county lines drugs gang relied on three runners with a combined age of 169 to push crack cocaine and heroin into market and spa towns.

Nicholas Ward, 32, ran the hotline from his home in West Bromwich, West Midlands, and employed runners, including Adrian Tipping, 61, John Kettle, 55, and Anthony Clarke, 53, to supply more than 80 'customers' in Malvern, Worcestershire, and Ledbury, Herefordshire.

It is thought Ward, known by his alias 'Nathan', made up to £75,000 before police stopped the gang in March 2018. The runners were largely paid in drugs.