Gang Murder in the UK
A police shooting shines light on London gun crime
The two 15-year olds rolled up on bicycles to the park in the British city of Bristol on a cold and dark afternoon in February. According to witnesses, they put on ski masks and marched up to 16-year-old Darrian Williams, who was sitting on a picnic bench with friends. “Are you 1-6?” they demanded, referring to the name of a Bristol gang from the Fishponds and Hillfields area.
A scuffle ensued. But within eight seconds, one of the attackers stabbed a kitchen knife into Darrian’s back. “2’s on top,” the attacker allegedly said, referring to another local gang.
Darrian managed to run onto a road, his back drenched in blood, and flagged down a van with a Bulgarian driver who spoke little English. The driver looked for a police station but then stopped at a Bulgarian supermarket and Darrian stumbled onto the street. The supermarket staff tried to perform first aid and called paramedics yet Darrian died at the scene.
At a trial in Bristol Crown Court in October, the attackers pled not guilty and claimed Darrian attacked first and they acted in self-defense. On Nov. 1, a jury found them guilty of murder.
The homicide was a tragic but typical example of the killings by a certain type of gang that has emerged in British cities over the last two decades. Sometimes called “postcode gangs,” the mobs are centered in London but have also popped up in other major sprawls such as Manchester and Birmingham and even small towns. The members come from a range of ethnic backgrounds, including those of African and Caribbean descent but also include Eastern Europeans and South Asians as well as mixed-raced and white British.
Many gang members are teenagers although they now include older veterans into their twenty and thirties. They are often linked to crews of rappers, or “emcees,” who perform a UK-form of drill music, with lyrics focused on drug dealing, stabbing and blasting.
Gang shootings were highlighted by another recent trial. In October, a jury at the Old Bailey (the central criminal court of England and Wales) found a London police officer not guilty of murder after he shot dead 24-year old Chris Kaba in 2022. Following the verdict, prosecutors released a video of Kaba shooting a rival in a London night club. They said he was from the notorious 67 (six-seven) gang from the Brixton neighborhood.
While gangs fire bullets into some victims, however, thanks to strict gun laws, they favor knives. In 2021, blades were used in three-quarters of murders in London, while firearms were wielded in just eight percent. A 2020 study estimated that 37 percent of murders in London were gang-related.
The level of death still pales in comparison to the most violent cities in the United States and Latin America. In 2023, London suffered 1.3 murders per 100,000 compared to 23 per 100,000 in Chicago, 60 in St Louis and 140 in Colima, Mexico. And murder levels in Britain have been fairly steady over the last 15 years.
Yet the postcode gangs are still a concerning problem. Youths in certain areas run a high risk of getting recruited or victimized, and ending up dead or behind bars. The gangs function as a form of low-level organized crime making money from drug dealing, theft and fraud. And with overcrowded prisons, underfunded police and plenty more marginalized youths coming up, there is danger of them getting much worse.
“It’s not about upbringing bruh [brother],” says Adzo, who was in the notorious OFB gang from Tottenham, London. “It’s about money. It’s about status. Social media has made it a lot lot worse because you see a lot of people that are portraying themselves in a certain image, and young people feel they have to keep up with the expectations.”
Many criminals have also told me that stabbings are actually harder to commit than shootings and reflect a grit in the UK gangs.
“With the gun it’s a press of a trigger,” says Zayaan, another ex-gang member. “With a knife you literally have to go up to someone and indulge your knife inside them. And to do so you have to be a savage.”
A different gang culture
The United Kingdom has a history of certain types of gangs from hoods shaking down bookmakers at race tracks in the 1920s (as portrayed in Peaky Blinders and Brighton Rock), to Hells Angels, skinheads and firms of football hooligans. More recently, there has also been…
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