3 teens kill homeless man

[woodrot]

'kin hell

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-22155807

so sad on all levels

[Vicanna]

Do you think they'll ban teenagers now?

[Jeremy]

It is indeed sad and tragic on all levels. However, having witnessed the attitudes of (of course a small minority of) the local teenagers during my University years, unfortunately I can't say I'm shocked.

[steveo]

Nice family

[LadyDeliah]

Birkenhead, over the river, is the capital of random violence.

Growing up in Birkenhead made me think random violence was part of everyone's life. Much as I'd like to blame it all on Maggie, there is a long history of violence there.

I have no idea why it's so bad on Merseyside, but it makes me sad.

[DJKillaQueen]

I grew up in Merseyside too (Liverpool) and I think you are being a bit unfair to the majority of people there LD! (and the statistics on violent crime don't back up your view either). Terrible things can happen anywhere (and do).

[Cassius]

Stories like this are just heartbreaking. Why is life so cheap?

[Otta]

Statistics probably don't back up LadyD's version because people don't tell the police.

I remember when I was staying at a friends for a few weeks when I'd gone up to Liverpool to do a work placement. One night we were on the way back from the pub, and there was a bloke kicking the shit out of some young lad (probably only 15/16) on the pavement. We ran up, and he stopped. It turned out he lived over the road, and knew my mate. He'd caught the lad trying to break in his house, and decided to teach him a lesson.

Anyway, he strolled back to his house, and we asked the boy if he was okay. Someone called out the window that they'd called the police, and the lad legged it. The police turned up a minute later and shone torches on our shoes looking for blood. Noone came out and said a word to them about who it was, even though the whole street had seen it out of their windows. The person who called the police did it to end the kicking, they had no intention of the bloke actually getting caught.

Most scousers I knew were lovely lovely people, and I love the place. I did however see a lot of fights and trouble, and it seemed accepted as a fact of life.

Look at that young black lad killed a few years ago. That wasn't your average attack, that was fucking brutal!

[DJKillaQueen]

Violent attacks happen everywhere. Ask the police policing a friday or saturday night in ANY city in the country. I spent 19 years of my life in Liverpool and never saw any violence personally, or knew anyone who was a vicitm of a random violent attack.............whereas in London.....

AND I absolutely refute that people in Liverpool accept violence as a fact of life. I still have family and many friends up there and they and their communities definitely do NOT think violence is ok.

You can't make assumptions like those above about any city and it's people. People don't carry out vicious brutal crimes because of their location. They do so because they are f*ckd up and people like that are found everywhere.

If however we want to draw conclusions about places and people because of rare high profile heinous crimes then it's London and the South East we should be talking about really.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_crimes_in_the_United_Kingdom#Child_Killers.2FKillings

[LadyDeliah]

Not sure which part you grew up in, but I expected to get jumped any time I had to walk through neighbouring areas and actually did on more than one occasion.

It was even worse for my brothers. The police were just as brutal.

When I came to London, I was really surprised that some people argued fiercely without glassing each other and I lived in Elephant & Castle.

I was most shocked by the fact that people were able to shout at police without getting dragged into a van and beaten up. No matter what DJKQ experienced in Liverpool, the experience of many people I know who grew up in Birkenhead was totally different.

Just remembered the last time I was out in Liverpool centre at a club about 5 yrs ago and there were bouncers every 10ft inside the club. On that one night, I saw someone get glassed, another person got bottled indide the club and a guy outside had his shirt off, covered in blood, shouting to some other guys to fight him if they were hard enough.

I'd forgotten how often I'd witnessed scenes like that both in Luverpool and Birkenhead. The only time I've ever seen anything close in London was at The Henry Cooper down Old Kent Rd in the 80's.

[Jeremy]

DJKillaQueen Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I spent 19 years of my life in

> Liverpool and never saw any violence personally,

> or knew anyone who was a vicitm of a random

> violent attack.............whereas in London.....

I spent only 3 years of my life in Liverpool, and unfortunately knew many more people who were violently attacked (or witnessed attacks) than in London. Although of course it does depend on the circles you mix in, and attacking students was something of a hobby for a small number of local teenagers. But generally the violence seemed a lot more random and pointless than in London.

> AND I absolutely refute that people in Liverpool

> accept violence as a fact of life. I still have

> family and many friends up there and they and

> their communities definitely do NOT think violence

> is ok.

I'm sure you have a fair point, it's entirely possible that the kind of situation otta describes may be restricted to certain roads/areas/individuals.

> People don't carry out vicious brutal crimes because of their location.

> They do so because they are f*ckd up and people

> like that are found everywhere.

I disagree. Some areas have a greater concentration of fucked up people than others (i.e. these people are often a product of their environment). Certain areas of Liverpool are seriously unsafe.

[malumbu]

Lived in the Pool in the mid 80s, when Thatcher had stuck the knife in (another case of corporate manslaughter?). Saw a couple of real Wild West brawls in late night bars with fists and glasses being thrown. More like a film set than a boxing match. That was about it really. Someone asked me the time outside a pub once. He wanted to know the time, rather than check out my accent and punch me. My mate answered in a dreadful attempt at a scouse accent - bit like George Osbourne really, and he was from just up the road in a posh bit bit of Merseyside.

Clearly sad news, but don't tar scousers all with the same brush (my sterotypical scousers stories, including nasty nasty touts, will wait for another time).

Went to a wedding at Birkinhead registry office. Seemed surprisingly nice. And mates live in Wallassey which is rather nice, and tolerent (can be a bit homophobic on the other side of the Mersey). And anywhwere assoicated with Half Man Half Biscuit must be half OK.

[woodrot]

I dont think Pool is any more violent than other large Norf cities to be fair. Especially ones that are still experiencing the rough transition to a post industrial stage- But its not about the cities as such, its about the social conditions that relate to certain areas & the ingrained poverty / deprivation and all that lefty stuff as well blates. Not going to get all fucking Durkheim and Weber though, Ill leave that for them guardian reader with letters after their names innit.

[LadyDeliah]

Things may have changed since I left in the 80's, but I know from my brother, who still lives up there that downtown Birkenhead still isn't safe on a Friday or Saturday night.

Anyway, I know there are loads of nice people who live on Merseyside, but I think there is also a very big underclass who don't follow the 'nice' rules and live a pretty brutal life. That's why the hideous acts of violence exhibited by young kids in instances like this, never surprise me.

I don't think denying there is a problem with violence in tbe area helps anyone.

[DJKillaQueen]

Liverpool/ Merseyside covers a wide area (Birkenhead is just a small section of the Wirral which is a pretty wealthy area on the whole).....and of course it has some spots that are worse than others...but every city has that.

I've seen plenty of violent crime in London....including seeing a 16 year old boy being stabbed and glassed by a group of other teensgers on my doorstep. I was a victim of a very serious random violent crime myself within two years of moving here. BUT....just because of those things I would never say London is unsafe or any better or worse for crime than anywhere else.

The insinuation by the above comments is that Liverpool/ Birkenhead has a violent mentality and that people tolerate it as normal. That just is not true. I can drag up plenty of stats that show that Liverpool is better than half a dozen other large cities including London for all types of crime.

[LadyDeliah]

I look forward to reading them DJKQ.

[Parkdrive]

Sorry, what's this thread about again?

[DJKillaQueen]

Here's a nice site aimed at students so they can judge which university cities are more crime ridden than others.............

http://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/preparing-to-go/staying-safe-and-secure/how-safe-is-your-city/

Liverpool has a similar level of violent crime to Cambridge! But the important issue is that there are 15 other UK cities that score higher for violent crime.

Even the ONS duplicates this data

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/crime-in-england-and-wales-2010-to-2011

Open 'Police force area data tables - Crime in England and Wales 2010/11 (Microsoft Excel file - 393kb)'

....and you will see that Merseyside has for 2010/11, 15,239 reported crimes of violence against the person. Compare this to Manchester 40,034, Lancashire 21,956, West Yorkshire 29,509, Staffordshire 18,309, West Midlands 41,499, London 166,596, Hampshire 32,023, Kent 20,073, Sussex 19,608, Thames Valley 35,906, Avon and Somerset 25,822, Devon and Cornwall 20,424, South Wales 18,274, even Essex is higher 20,995!

There's an awful lot of southern violent crime there too, somewhat blowing the myth that violence is more prevalent in the North.

What leads to violent crime is perhaps another debate, but I think the data above illustrates the danger is making assunptions about areas and the people that live in them. I think it also illustrates how perception is often wrong in the face of the data.

[Otta]

Yes but as I said, figures on crime only show up crimes that are reported.

[StraferJack]

Essex does have nearly half a million more people tho

[TillieTrotter]

My ex sister in law ran pubs in Liverpool for years. I used to love going up there for the excitement. There was a kick off every night I was there literally. Calm down, Calm down!!

[El Pibe]

I grew up in sleepy hertfordshire, as a sixth former went out in Hitchin where the general order of things was

Go out, have a few pint

Chat up girls

have more pints

watch a fight or two

have more pint

get kebab

watch another three or fights

wait in cab rank

watch at least two more fights

go home.

Casual violence comes from boredom, youth and/or a drinking to oblivion culture and is endemic.

The bruter kind comes from being fucked up in one form or another, hence why it's more commonly associated with a generational cycle of poor parenting fostered by the usual social deprivational suspects, and is closely associated with troubled inner city areas, be they in Birkenhead, Peckham, Chapeltown etc etc etc.

You're all grown up enough to know this.

North, South, East, West, Scotland, England, South Wales, North Wales, yaaaaaawn, it's silly to even pursue this argument.

And of course nothing is black and white, I don't doubt Birkenhead is more dangerous than Hitchin, but as stated, it produced Half Man Half Biscuit and is worthy of veneration for that alone.

[Cassius]

Isn't there a big difference between getting drunk and having a fight (which I agree can and does happen anywhere) and three kids kicking a man to death for fun?

[El Pibe]

err yes, that's my point.

Sorry perhaps I wasn't clearly enough, getting drunk and punching each other is casual.

Despite the apparently casual manner in which these kids perpetrated this horror I would definitely file it under brutal violence.

The latter comes from neglect, abuse blah blah and is, 'more closely associated with inner city..social deprivation'.

Of course there's nothing to prevent it happening elsewhere.

[Lowlander]

DJKillaQueen Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Here's a nice site aimed at students so they can

> judge which university cities are more crime

> ridden than others.............

>

> http://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/prepar

> ing-to-go/staying-safe-and-secure/how-safe-is-your

> -city/

>

> Liverpool has a similar level of violent crime to

> Cambridge! But the important issue is that there

> are 15 other UK cities that score higher for

> violent crime.

>

> Even the ONS duplicates this data

>

> https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/crime-i

> n-england-and-wales-2010-to-2011

>

> Open 'Police force area data tables - Crime in

> England and Wales 2010/11 (Microsoft Excel file -

> 393kb)'

>

> ....and you will see that Merseyside has for

> 2010/11, 15,239 reported crimes of violence

> against the person. Compare this to Manchester

> 40,034, Lancashire 21,956, West Yorkshire 29,509,

> Staffordshire 18,309, West Midlands 41,499, London

> 166,596, Hampshire 32,023, Kent 20,073, Sussex

> 19,608, Thames Valley 35,906, Avon and Somerset

> 25,822, Devon and Cornwall 20,424, South Wales

> 18,274, even Essex is higher 20,995!

>

> There's an awful lot of southern violent crime

> there too, somewhat blowing the myth that violence

> is more prevalent in the North.

>

> What leads to violent crime is perhaps another

> debate, but I think the data above illustrates the

> danger is making assunptions about areas and the

> people that live in them. I think it also

> illustrates how perception is often wrong in the

> face of the data.

I would suggest that in Liverpool there is a tendancy to under-report crime...having spent equal time there and in Cambridge, I definately saw more trouble in Liverpool.

Lovely place though. And it's not just Liverpool that under-records crime. And let us not forget how brutal the Met police were back in the 1980s during the miner's strikes.