Turks and Trident and the Olympics

This week, (Thursday 9 Feb 2012) Hackney's new borough commander, Acting Chief Superintendent Rob Jones, commented on the implications for Hackney following the murder of Ali Armagan on 1 February. (Details here from Evening Standard and here from the Hackney Gazette).



Armagan was believed to be the leader of the Bombacilar gang - Blood and Property had a look at the history of the gang here: Turkish Crime - Turkish Politics. (And here's another much more in depth account from London Street Gangs with a map showing that Bombacilar territory is Hackney.)

Rob Jones said: "After consulting with Turkish/Kurdish leaders in Haringey, Hackney and Enfield, it seems many of you are thinking back to the events of 2009 which led to the tragic deaths of several men in a cycle of violence." (Evening Standard 2009 feature: Heroin wars, loan sharks and executions...)

He said that the current investigation was a top priority as was a commitment to "preventing any escalation or reprisals".

The investigation is being carried out by detectives from Operation Trident which - according to Met's own website still deals with "only gun related murders within the black community". So why are they looking at a Turkish murder?

I thought there was a police unit that dealt with Turkish crime but a police spokesperson said there wasn't one, and never had been.  Instead it was explained that Trident investigates all non fatal gun crime in London. That is non fatal -  not fatal.

It also investigates all the fatal gun crime in the black community.

The gun crimes it doesn't automatically investigate are the fatal ones that don't involve the black community.

So if this latest Turkish shooting hadn't resulted in a death it would have been investigated by Trident.

But because there was a killing and the victim wasn't black the crime falls into a category that Trident wouldn't usually investigate.

However - according to a police spokesperson - at the moment Trident does currently have the resources to investigate this case so it is. A Hackney police spokesperson said that the Met's
SCD1 MIT teams were involved (in which SCD stands for Specialist Crime Directorate and MIT stands for Murder Investigation Team).

Acting Chief Supt Jones also said Trident has a "reputation for achieving fantastic results in extremely difficult circumstances" adding "They will be working tirelessly to identify, arrest and  convict the killers". He added that Hackney had been given a "wealth of additional resources to help us maintain an increased  presence  on the street".

Would all this help be there if the Olympics weren't due to start in few months time?

Police Watch  of the past...

Back in 2010 I was thinking about keeping up with the Hackney Gazette's Police Watch page but I didn't get further than the stuff below which I thought I'd post - it's just a list of dates of the Hackney Gazette police watch column and the subjects covered only giving more detail in a few spots.

July 1 2010:  Domestic violence. Nearly one in five murders in London are accounted for by domestic violence.
Cycle theft: 30 strong bike team, on bikes,  investigating and preventing bike theft across London.
Tackling gay hate crime workshops.
Kerol Farquharson wanted on recall to prison.

June 17 2010: Opening of the safer neighbourhood team in Finsbury Park. For environmental crime and noisy neighbours as  well as other things.
Beware distraction burglars - keep doors locked even when you're in your home.
Moynal Miah wanted on a recall to prison.

June 10 2010 none

June 3 2010 none

May 27 none

Thursday May 20 2010:
Message from borough commander Steve Bending. Zero tolerance of gang crime.

"To force home the message and the seriousness of the issue, we have also included a series of raids on the homes of known gang members and those known to be involved in crime."

 Targeting one area of the borough at a time - 107 arrests in 3 weeks. Recovered three guns including a Mac 10 (capable of firing over 1000 bullets a minute but unlikely to happen due to most bullets being homemade (see April 22) or see Telegraph piece: “There would be a lot more murders,” says Professor John Pitts, who has studied the phenomenon extensively, “were it not for one factor: the difficulty in obtaining bullets.”)
£200,000 cash seized as proceeds of crime - assets targeted: "We can take profit away from them and stop crime paying for these people".

In this piece in East London Lines, the unsuccessful Tory mayoral candidate, Andrew Boff, says that he thinks the gang crime in Hackney is much higher than figures show.

Thursday May 13 2010: No Police Watch

Thursday May 6 2010: Police Watch: Agnes response. Safer schools, Operation Radium (targeting youth violence); Operation Bantam (gangs, firearms, drugs), Operation Spoke (youths using bikes to commit crime), Operation Curb (targeting 10-20-year-olds seen as "likely to enter criminality")
Register property online
Wanted: Wayne Worrell

Thursday April 29 2010: No Police Watch

Thursday April 22 2010: (Front Page: Tears for Agnes) No Police Watch, but "Top cop moves to calm fears over gun crime"... Steve Bending says: "This is an extraordinarily rare incident. In terms of people being killed or injured in shootings, the numbers are low."
"Most of these groups are informal structures, not organised gangs. They are chaotic.
Weapons: Most firearms are converted, blank-firing guns and most of the ammunition is home made... they are inaccurate weapons with poor ammunition."
Biggest problem is silence.

Thursday April 15 2010: Missing person's unit, magazine for teenagers, burglar wanted, anti-terror

Thursday April 8 2010: Not this week

Thursday April 1 2010: Godwin Lawson ("by far the most difficult article I've had to write"). Investigation being led by Det Chief Insp Jessica Wadsworth of the Homicide Command.
Software protection.
Wanted: prisoner recall Carlton Anderson. Originally imprisoned for supplying drugs.
Neighbourhood watch in mosque.

Thursday March 25 (Front page: Turkish woman shot on doorstep) None

Thursday March 28 (Front page: Cycling tragedy) Police Watch: Vice operation (36 arrests total): Prostitutes and Kerb crawlers (13 repeat offenders, 11 new ones).
Travel safety:
Wanted: Peter Carvell, recall to prison, originally imprisoned for burglary.
Safer Neighbourhoods coffee morning, Stoke Newington.