12 year old arrested

[Pixxie7]

Do you think the police acted appropriately given that they had a tip off that a boy was waving a gun around.

I’d also like to add why has this young boy got a BB gun that looks like a real gun? Where is his mothers mind at? What does she think he is going to do with it? What is he firing it at?

My neighbours cat was peppered with bb pellets and had to be PTS. I just don’t understand the thought process of allowing your secondary level son to wander around with a gun replica that fires high speed pellets that hurt or kill small animals.

White children up and down have toy BB guns and when and yet when a black child is playing with one (legally, as all the links I linked says it’s illegal to sell one to under 18s but legal to give it as a present) in his own living room, all the blame falls on the mother.

And also weird how police turned up at house at midnight, the mum says there were sleeping. I’m sure the house looked like a real hotbed of activity at midnight - not!

There was no need for police to send 10 armed officers in to what was a quiet house at midnight with people asleep. The fact that passer by said the boy was black would have had a big part to do with the disproportionate response.

Perhaps BB guns should be made completely illegal, or be heavily licensed?

The police were 100% correct. The mother seems like an absolute idiot!

Also the police have said it was a toy BB gun, not a BB gun.

There are powerful BB guns which could be used as weapons and need a license, but this was not one so examples of being hurt by BB guns are irrelevant.

If it was a powerful BB gun with no license, the mum would have been arrested and the police would not have apologised.

@CallmeAngelina

So, maybe off-topic slightly, but what are people meant to think if they see a "toy" gun, painted blue/red/whatever, but it actually turns out to be a "real" gun that someone has painted to disguise it.

I the chances of that are really really slim. Guns are really heavy, you would be able to see the difference between a light plastic gun to a heavy metal one.

@Cadent

White children up and down have toy BB guns and when and yet when a black child is playing with one (legally, as all the links I linked says it’s illegal to sell one to under 18s but legal to give it as a present) in his own living room, all the blame falls on the mother.

And also weird how police turned up at house at midnight, the mum says there were sleeping. I’m sure the house looked like a real hotbed of activity at midnight - not!

There was no need for police to send 10 armed officers in to what was a quiet house at midnight with people asleep. The fact that passer by said the boy was black would have had a big part to do with the disproportionate response.

No, the mother was asleep. The boy was in the living room.

Secondly, reading the law it's illegal.for anyone under 18 to use these without adult supervision so who are all these children that you know who have them and are playing with them? I.linked an article here yesterday detailing at least two people killed by air guns - one a six year old boy killed by his great grandfather the other a young teen. Is that really something you want a child playing with?

Bloody hell..Are we going to have the "cold dead hands" speech next?

@CallmeAngelina

So, maybe off-topic slightly, but what are people meant to think if they see a "toy" gun, painted blue/red/whatever, but it actually turns out to be a "real" gun that someone has painted to disguise it.

That's a good one. People will always find a way, won't they? That's why I don't think crime can ever be stopped. Makes more sense to have properly and continuously trained law enforcement agents that can be trusted and people should trust to do their jobs (has to go hand in hand)......

or.... just ban everything...including paints.

But why should a black mother have to think twice about deadly consequences to her and her family of giving her DS a BB gun, while a white mother wouldn't need to take into account any consideration apart from the safety of local squirrels?

EVERY parent should think twice about giving a child a gun.

It is a WEAPON!

Even in play, a BB gun, or an air gun can blind another person or cause serious injury.

Your child might be in your garden shooting at a target on your fence - what if the shot misses, and hits someone on the other side.

If your child it genuinely interested in weapons, enrol them in a gun club. Keep their gun locked up (preferably at the club) when not being used for their interest. Guns are dangerous.

Some years ago, a teenage boy accidentally shot and killed his little sister very close to where I live. He was babysitting. His friend came round and they removed the father's gun from its locked cabinet. The gun was loaded (it shouldn't have been) but broken. The boy unbroke it, squeezed the trigger to show his friend - and it went off, killings sister (who was about 9, I think). It was dreadful for that family. They lost a child. And how the boy or his father can ever come to terms with their own part in that, I don't know.

It is too easy to have an accident with gun, no matter how careful you think you are being.

I don’t think any 12 year old boy should be arrested for having a toy gun

He wasn't. He was placed under arrest while they inspected the gun, then released.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras the reports I read said the boy was in the living room when the passer by saw him, not that he was in the living room when the police came?

As I said, you don’t seem to be differentiating between BB guns and toy air guns. You can’t kill someone with what this boy had.

You only need to go on BB gun forums to see just how many people have the toy ones and let their kids play with them.

Cold dead hands is irrelevant to me as I neither want or have any sort of weapon, I just don’t like the double standards where a black boy has to be whiter than white to avoid armed police.

People need to take responsibility for the consequences of actions. The consequence of allowing your son to have an imitation forearm is that someone might mistake it for the real thing and call the police.

TBH - I think this should have been a good lesson for this young man not to mess about with guns.

@SchadenfreudePersonified He is 12yrs old!

You can lose your eyesight or hearing from being hit in the face with a bloody BB gun.

Its a BB gun, not a "toy gun" no matter how you spin it.

It looks "Real" and can cause serious and permanent injury.

What the fuck is a 12 year old boy doing with a BB gun anyway?

[quote Cadent]@Hearhoovesthinkzebras the reports I read said the boy was in the living room when the passer by saw him, not that he was in the living room when the police came?

As I said, you don’t seem to be differentiating between BB guns and toy air guns. You can’t kill someone with what this boy had.

You only need to go on BB gun forums to see just how many people have the toy ones and let their kids play with them.

Cold dead hands is irrelevant to me as I neither want or have any sort of weapon, I just don’t like the double standards where a black boy has to be whiter than white to avoid armed police.[/quote]
The colour of the person is irrelevant. A passer by saw a gun. You can't expect them to go in and ask to examine it in order to determine if it's real or not. It looks like a gun. If you aren't used to guns I'm.quite sure you would think that was real.

They reported it to the police.

The piece mount a standard response to reports of a firearm.

Moral of story - don't own a replica or imitation firearm if you don't want armed police knocking on your door.

Well his DF could have been through the back actually with a gun - how would the police know on entering that that was the only gun, all be it toy, they could have a full arsenal elsewhere in the house with several criminals hiding out. Police can't make assumptions that something is harmless without checking.
I'd like to see some of these brave posters entering a house where there has been reported sightings of a man with a gun. I'm sure they are very polite to the lady and nicely ask if someone is playing with a toy gun and if so could they have it, crossing their fingers they don't get shot dead by some nutter inside.

Also, even if it couldn't fire a pellet why would a parent buy a realistic weapon like that for their kid?

You can get all sorts of toy guns that look nothing like a real one. In this day and age where gun violence is a real issue in certain places why would a mum buy him something that looks like a real weapon?

What if he had had taken it outside and taken it out and been shot by someone else thinking it was real?

Who's fault would it be then?

@SmileEachDay

I've never said I'm not open to assuming there is a racist element

No you haven’t. Lots of people on the thread have though.

But you quoted my post and then made the comment.

I am just trying to say if you are going to assign the actions of the police to race you have to also look at the race of everyone involved including the person who reported the crime and all the police who attended - including the one who ordered the ARV to attend

@Andthewinnerislucky

Who is this "passerby" passing by in the middle of the night and looking into houses long enough to determine a gun looks real and not someone playing with/holding something? This person's eyes must be sharp.

Didn't anyone see him/her to report as a suspicious person walking along what seems like a quiet neighbourhood in the middle of the night?

What's everyone doing up at that time? People can stay up however long they want but the whole business of we're up at midnight and a passerby happens to be along just at the opportuned time to witness this "gun-waving" is quite convenient.

Wasn't this a neighbour or something or some nightwatch person? What's the ethnicity of this 'witness' btw?

So many questions...

Camden is always busy. You can be standing at a bus stop at 4.45am and there are just as many people around as if you're waiting for a bus at 8.15am in a standard commuter town.

At midnight, it might as well be 8pm.

@EnoughAlready2020

Absolutely not. It's disgusting behaviour from the police and it absolutely wouldn't have happened if he was a 12 year old white boy. They used guns with lasers.

I can't believe how frightened he and his mum must have been. The only thing that kid has learned is to be afraid of the police. As his mum said, if playing with a toy gun is an offence then make it law. But what really is the law of the land is that it's only BLACK kids that can't play with toy guns.

Was this meant to be a joke?

Btw those are 'lasers' are not harmful. They are so the office knows where his gun is aimed.

Maybe all toy guns should be banned now. It's a shame, but with kids going into school and shooting their classmates what are you supposed to do?

At least they should be made to look nothing like a real gun. I remember as a kid seeing my 'man from uncle' gun in a glass case and realising it was actually impossible to tell them apart.

I would be just as judging of the mother letting her 12yo having a BB gun no matter what colour their skin was, especially if he can have access to it at night when everyone else is asleep. Not very supervised.

@hadenoughbleach

Do people not seem to understand that this child was sitting IN HIS OWN HOUSE when SO19 came armed and arrested him in the middle of the night???

• he wasn't waving the toy gun around in a public place
• he wasn't an adult or a "big strapping lad"

Completely disproportionate and OTT response from the police. This child will be absolutely traumatised by this experience.

And perhaps the person who reported it was traumatised at seeing a young child late at night in their lounge with what looked to be a real gun.

Perhaps that person had real concerns he would injure himself or someone else.

If this was a white 12yo boy with a BB gun would people also think the police over reacted?

Perhaps BB guns should be made completely illegal, or be heavily licensed?

Why make them illegal? They have their uses and people enjoy them.

They are already restricted, they have been restricted since 2007. I couldn't buy any of my realistic airsoft guns without being member of an organisation to justify why I need them, this was set up after the VCR Act.

The two tone paint job on the gun that is the subject of this thread is an exemption of the rule, enabling them to be sold to people who aren't registered, and it's an offence to paint it to look more realistic if you do not have that justification. It's the government who decided that half the of the guns have to be painted.

But you quoted my post and then made the comment

It’s an open thread - it was a response to you and the thread. I’m sorry if you felt I was misrepresenting you.

To be clear - I haven’t assigned any actions of the police to race.

The link I posted up there has some interesting stats about diversity within the police force.

@Gobbycop

I'm a current armed officer in the UK.

Glad most of you recognise you can't just send unarmed cops around based on this information.

That's how firearms jobs play out, based on information received.

It's piss easy to be an expert on the matter in hindsight with all the details isn't it?

The daily mail article is hopeless, they haven't got a clue.

Thank you for responding continuously to dangerous situations to keep us - the public safe.

I realise in most situations the outcome isn't that the police are lucky enough to be faced with a young child and a BB gun and aren't actually in any real danger.