This is Croydon 2024.
First aid: passers-by helped the shopkeeper after this morning’s attack on Church Street
A Church Street shopkeeper was stabbed this morning, as two boys robbed his store. The boys have been described by an eye-witness as being as young as 13 to 15 years old.
It took police officers 30 minutes to attend the scene, according to on-lookers.
The man’s wounds are thought to be not serious.
This latest incident occurred just yards away from where Rijkaard Siafa was attacked and killed in an incident on Surrey Street in April this year.
Scotland Yard this afternoon issued this statement: “Police were called at approximately 11.20 on Thursday, July 11, to reports of a stabbing in Church Street.
“Officers and London Ambulance Service attended and found a man suffering a stab injury – he was taken to hospital for treatment.
“Two males were arrested at the scene on suspicion of GBH and robbery. Both remain in custody. A crime scene remains in place.”
Traders working in Surrey Street market and Church Street say that they remain neglected by the police, the council and the local BID, “business improvement district”, that receives public grants used to pay private security contractors to patrol North End. Croydon Mayor Jason Perry is a director of Croydon BID.
Shopkeepers and stall-holders on Surrey Street say that they have been appealing for greater police presence on the market, to deal with rising incidents of crime, including drug dealing going on in broad daylight. “We’re ignored by the police,” said one source.
Crime watch: Anthony King, left, together with Croydon Mayor Jason Perry
Yet meanwhile, in the past three years, the MyEnds organisation, run by “community organiser” Anthony King, which operates in partnership with Croydon Voluntary Action, has received £1.6million in grants from MOPAC – the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime – with a brief to work with Croydon’s communities in an effort to reduce gang-related and drugs-related violent crime.
In 2023, 11 people were killed on the streets of Croydon.
Croydon Council has a Neighbourhood Safety Board, which since 2018 has been chaired by “community organiser” Donna Murray-Turner. The Board is supposed to be the borough-wide forum for the public and councillors to scrutinise the police’s operations in the borough. With Murray-Turner as chair, Croydon’s Neighbourhood Safety Board has not held a single meeting since 2019.
Following today’s latest knife crime incident in the town centre, Superintendent Mitch Carr, who leads for community policing in Croydon, told Inside Croydon: “We acknowledge the concerns of those who work in Surrey Street and our town centre officers regularly patrol the area and speak to market traders.
“We also need this to be a full partnership approach, as improving the perception of safety in Croydon town centre cannot be achieved just by the police.
Police patrol: Supt Mitch Carr
“We will continue to work closely with key partners including the local authority, Croydon BID and community organisations.”
The Metropolitan Police is appealling for witnesses to today’s knife attack on Church Street. Anyone with information is asked to call 101 or ‘X’ @MetCC and quote CAD3082/11Jul.
You can also provide information anonymously to the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.
Read more: After five-week delay, police issue appeal over bus stabbing
Read more: CronxWatch returns asking: ‘Where are Croydon’s police?’
Read more: Community groups demand dismissal of convicted Met officer
Read more: Croydon in 2023: London’s borough with most murder victims
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My best wishes go out to the person stabbed in this incident.
I now know why I bumped into some tape when walking up Church Street earlier today, after a visit to the dentist. I got great support from a local police constable, named Toby, who clearly knew how to guide a blind person. He took me round the tape, got me back on the pavement and told me where I was and in what direction I was going. The police often get criticized, but on this occasion I couldn’t have asked for any more.
its getting so sad in croydon why ellen was takeing 281 days ago you dont here about the suspects trial why ? tue in bushey even more shocking mr hunt without wife 2 loving daughters working lingfield then came home to that shocking then took suspect to hospital by air ambulance why dont understand lets all love unite
It’s really tragic that we have this sort of abhorrent behaviour in Croydon, or anywhere at all come to that.
The police are surely only a small part of the story. I’m convinced many of the young people of today feel neglected by the authorities and for all sorts of reasons can’t see a decent future ahead of them.
Stabbing and such violent behaviour should never be normalised but somehow Croydon’s dysfunctional community services supposedly led by the council is in dire straits. I have enough trouble seeing the light at the end of the tunnel in this borough as an adult so I can’t think what it must be like for a young person right now.
These perpetrators have to be brought to justice but there needs to be some kind of turnaround in the community for this sort of situation ever to be eradicated. Innocent people should not have to live in fear of their lives.
Your crime correspondent, Claude Dumbo, writes:
Anyone expecting Mayor Jason Perry “to do something” is going to be sorely disappointed. Until recently he ran one of a network of websites celebrating crime and enabling racism.
His Cabinet Member for Community Safety, Councillor Ola Kolade , is doing a great job in taking the extra £27½k he gets for being responsible for ASB and Community Safety, serious youth violence, youth safety, violence reduction and prevention, police partnerships and domestic violence.
https://democracy.croydon.gov.uk/mgUserInfo.aspx?UID=1036
But what’s he doing to actually earn that dosh? Nothing.
Kolade is meant to serve on two relevant committees, the Safer Croydon Partnership and the Safer Neighbourhood Board. If the Council’s website is to be believed, there haven’t been any meetings of either since he was appointed by Perry in May 2022.
The problems predate his elevation. It seems the Board last met in November 2019 and no meetings have been scheduled since one due for November 2021, which was cancelled. With the Partnership, no meetings can be found at all. Which is odd, as the council’s website says “The Safer Croydon Partnership acts as the statutory Community Safety Partnership for Croydon as stipulated by the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.”
https://democracy.croydon.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=20948
Is the Council ignoring its legal responsibilities?
It’s not all bad news though. Last November, Perry boasted that he’s secured £165k from the Tory government’s Safer Streets Fund, to tackle crime in the town centre. Apparently “a new taskforce has been set up to make Croydon’s town centre cleaner and safer for everyone”. It comprises “key statutory, community and voluntary sector organisations in the borough, who will work together to clean up hotspot areas and deal with antisocial behaviour”.
https://lbc-app-w-newscroydon-p.azurewebsites.net/croydon-council-secures-165k-safer-streets-funding-for-town-centre/
Who is on that taskforce the council’s press release fails to say. But the good news is that the taskforce has already successfully tackled two unauthorised encampments, clearing items from public areas, footpaths and underpasses, making them safer and preventing hazards for people walking nearby and local businesses.
https://x.com/JasonForCroydon/status/1810785944632500385
https://x.com/yourcroydon/status/1810680642323005812
The traders of Surrey Street and Church Street will be reassured that Perry is listening to concerns (and then ignoring them) and that an undisclosed sum of the £185k awarded has been spent on cleaning up a bit of West Croydon station car park.
Perhaps some of that squandered taxpayers’ money could be diverted into training the Council’s PR team on writing a better headline than “Taskforce gets town centre cleaner and safer”
https://news.croydon.gov.uk/taskforce-gets-town-centre-cleaner-and-safer/