Stones, chairs, coins, shoes There was a lot of chat on social media about people looking to kill a police officer. Police officers from the Essex and Suffolk forces are sent to help the Met. As the clock ticks into a fourth day of unrest, disorder spreads beyond London. A police station in Handsworth, Birmingham, is set on fire. One in Nottingham is firebombed. Cars burn in south Liverpool. There's rioting in the centre of Manchester, in Salford and West Bromwich.
In the Bootle area of Merseyside a dumper truck is used to break into a post office. A couple of lads on a moped came right up to the line - they were counting us and then they went back. Then the whole crowd started marching up the road, with a four-door saloon car as a figurehead. It was absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt, attempted murder.
Rioters are not just attacking the police and looting - they start to set fire to their own neighbourhoods, including shops with residential flats above. Among the targets is a local landmark, the year-old Reeves furniture store. Lewisham has roaming groups of people stirring up trouble. At least people loot a Tesco in Bethnal Green.
Fires are started in Lambeth, petrol bombs thrown in Hackney. Because we wanted to see everything on fire. To show them, 'what can you do now? There's nothing you can do'". And I felt good. Mr Cameron says there are contingency plans for water cannon to be used at 24 hours' notice. The Ministry of Justice says there are enough prison places for all.
The shops ran out of stuff. All the phone shops went instantly. Magistrates' courts in London, Solihull and Manchester among others stay open through the night to fast-track those already in custody for disorder-related offences. The shops did not trouble them. That's the shops their mums and their gran have to go to.
The post office - they've got grandparents - there's no post office for the elderly. Police combed CCTV footage to identify culprits. Over the following months, more than 2, people were traced, charged and convicted.
Like, I'm on it. And it was blatantly obvious they were stolen. And then someone asked me for a pair and I gave them a pair, and the street cameras caught my face. There was no official government inquiry after the riots, but there were reports by other bodies. Opportunism, social deprivation, discontent with the police and unemployment were all mentioned, but a single overwhelming cause for what happened over those five days in August was not pinpointed.
Over the days that followed, the police were roundly criticised. The Met later acknowledged that its inability to monitor social media meant it could not get ahead of events. Analyses following the riots found that police tactics were hampered by inadequate numbers, that they should sometimes have intervened more promptly and assertively, and that intelligence was flawed.
They all praised the bravery of the officers on the frontline. Ministry of Justice figures show a total of 1, offenders were jailed for their part in the trouble.
Rioting was seen as an aggravating factor. Sentences were longer and more people were sent to prison than would normally be expected for the same charges under different circumstances. Nice little story for them, isn't it? You know, like World War Two and that with my great-grandads. If it was to happen again, I would happily join in.
Anything against the police, I would happily join in. I was there for revenge. For once they were living on the edge, they felt how we felt. They felt threatened by us. Arne L. He is Editor of Social Forces. Our Privacy Policy sets out how Oxford University Press handles your personal information, and your rights to object to your personal information being used for marketing to you or being processed as part of our business activities.
We will only use your personal information to register you for OUPblog articles. Or subscribe to articles in the subject area by email or RSS. I found this article very readable — we all seek to solve the issue of public unrest and many of us I suspect, are frustrated by the inability to change things quickly and for the better.
Social Forces Published in partnership with the Department of Sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Social Forces is recognized as a global leader among social research journals. Read More. By Arne L. How do you know who rioted? Carpetright store after Tottenham riots by Alan Stanton. Subscribe to the OUPblog via email: Our Privacy Policy sets out how Oxford University Press handles your personal information, and your rights to object to your personal information being used for marketing to you or being processed as part of our business activities.
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