Police 'call-in' of South Kilburn youth seen as threatening and undermining justice principles

The above letter written to some local young people by the Metropolitan Police Brent Borough Commander has unsurprisingly caused them and their parents considerable alarm as well as raising the issue of civil liberties and what appears to be an undermining of the principle of 'Innocent until proven guilty'.

Particularly disquieting is the last paragraph which appears to contain a threat of continuing police harassment if the recipient does not comply. It has also given rise to fears that this constitutes another example of racial profiling by the police when their are concerns about disproportionality regarding Stop and search in the local BME community (see table at the end of the article).

The apparently template letter contains no evidence that the recipient is involved in criminal activity.

The Guardian has covered the issue in detail LINK.  Cecil Gutzmore who attended the meeting as an observer from the London campaign Against police and State Violence said that the two recipients and their mothers who attended the meeting were 'very strong' and that the police conceded that the tone of the letter was wrong.

The Guardian article reports:

Roy Croasdaile, chairman of the Brent Stop and Search Monitoring Group, who saw the letter in advance, said he was not comfortable with its content, although he supported the meeting’s aim. “I was the first person to amend and send feedback from the young man I spoke to and [his] solicitors to the police with regard to the ambiguity and offence that was taken,” he said. 

“After all, it was meant to be an invitation to obtain support and was received as threatening. We have all learned lessons from this for the future and I would like to think that this will not be repeated.”

Croasdaile added that the two young men who did attend proved to be “the stars of the meeting”, making a big impact on how it progressed and engaging with the charitable groups that had come to help them

A Metropolitan Police spokesperson said that the letter was deliberately strongly worded to ensure gang members were in no doubt about what awaited them if they continued with their 'current behaviour'.


Giovanna Midgeley of StopWatch said

It is bewildering that Brent police will be considering non-responses from households an admission of criminal activity. Guilt is proven by good police work, not by whether someone attends a meeting or not.

The 'call-in' strategy is similar to that used in the Operation Shield pilot in  Lambeth. A critique of the strategy has been submitted by the organisation London Against Police Violence and can be found HERE

From the Brent Stop and Search Equality impact Assessment: LINK