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.

Probably over reacted. But I'm more concerned about the person who made a report. Someone in their own home had a toy gun and that warranted a call to the police. I wonder what it was about the situation that led the person to assume it was real?

@CodexDevinchi good for you. When someone reported our white neighbour having a gun, yes armed police turned up and yes they even cordoned the street but they didn't bash down the door and just asked the guy to come to the door with his hands up. Actually this was in Islington just down the road from where this happened.

@CuriousaboutSamphire but there is a requirement that they be ‘two-tone’. To avoid confusion with real guns.

Winner because body language would also influence the person who reported the crime.
There is a difference in the 2 portrayals.

And his cocky attitude may have been the body language he had whilst he had a gun. That would influence the danger someone felt existed and also whether they believed it was a real gun or not.

[quote EnoughAlready2020]@CodexDevinchi good for you. When someone reported our white neighbour having a gun, yes armed police turned up and yes they even cordoned the street but they didn't bash down the door and just asked the guy to come to the door with his hands up. Actually this was in Islington just down the road from where this happened. [/quote]
I don’t think they did bash down the door, his mum said the boy opened the door

www.channel4.com/news/mother-accuses-police-of-racial-profiling-after-12-year-old-son-arrested-by-armed-officers

I think this video is interesting- I don’t think he looks “cocky” or older. I think he looks like any one of the kids in Y7/8 at my school on parents eve.

But tongue tied and as though he’d rather not be there.

The description of exactly what happen is interesting also.

Another risk the police have to consider is the risk to the boy himself. As the 999 transcript hasn’t been released we don’t know the exact wording, child may have been said or not, black might have been said after asking for a description. But someone sitting in a sofa holding a gun (no way of telling at night with low light if that is real or not) is a risk, even if it is only to themselves. Imagine if the police didn’t respond as they are only sitting on the sofa and then the child kills themselves.

Once a gun is mentioned there is a standard protocol. Go in, arrest the ‘suspect’ clear the property and do a search. It is not unknown for a real gun to be hidden and a fake presented as evidence. Once no gun is found the person is de-arrested.

The investigation will check if this protocol is followed, not if the protocol is over the top.

Also, some real guns are being painted in 2-tone to make them look like BB guns, so without actually getting hands on a realistic looking weapon it is impossible to tell.

We have no way of knowing how he was acting when he had the bb gun. His attitude in the clip has nothing to do with what happened, it is irrelevant. Why bring it up?

@itsgettingweird I agree body language does inluence perception but I don't quite see it in this case of the passerby (again, I wonder if it's a neighbour, not just a random) except now that he's in the news.

I also wonder if the attitude you're seeing is that of a boy obviously put out by all that's happened/ing or general...as you say 'teenager demeanour'?

And I still say his attitude is neither here nor there regarding what happened then unless this witness already knew 'him and his attitude', suspected him of being one of the "wrong'uns" and saw the appropriate chance to call the police when he saw him holding what looks like a gun.

@Cadent as pictures up thread show a fairly dark blue is one colour choice. Not especially obvious even in daylight. It pays lip service to the law.

And yes, I have seen and used them, so I do know what they look like. Never seems a flourescent one! They probably exist but I've never met a milsim using one.

I have just seen the answer to the question.

@EnoughAlready2020

Okay let's victim blame the mum for allowing her son play with a toy gun IN HER OWN HOME - something millions of kids do every day. It doesn't matter if you think that was a poor parenting decision - it's not illegal. Yes the police turned up, yes they needed to investigate it, but no they didn't need to point lasers and guns at kids. The toy was a TOY BB gun. Ie it shoots pellets at low speed. The kid wasn't killing your pet cats ffs.

This reminds me of this case in the US amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/26/central-park-new-york-white-woman-black-birdwatcher where anyone can make an allegation against a black person and extreme force is used.

I'm so tired of the "why make everything a race conversation" brigade. I think it's fair to say that if this 12 year old kid wasn't black and the family wasn't black, such an extreme response wouldn't have been used.

I'm trying to figure out how you "play" with a toy gun in your living room at that time of night

What do you do? Point it, do fast draws like a cowboy? Pose with it?

@TheletterZ very true, what if Kai had run away to another room? I suspect he would have been shot.

@SmileEachDay thanks for sharing that. Kai looks disturbed and his mum was very calm and measured.

Ridiculous. Teenage ds2 has some decommissioned and obsolete calibre rifles that he has collected and he likes to practise with them in his bedroom. He goes shooting for real with the air cadets. I wouldn't be happy if the police turned up.

[quote Cadent]@TheletterZ very true, what if Kai had run away to another room? I suspect he would have been shot.

@SmileEachDay thanks for sharing that. Kai looks disturbed and his mum was very calm and measured.[/quote]
Is there some reason you're using the lad's first name, twice in the one post

Cod psychology

@mathanxiety

...she should have taken a long look at herself and apologised to her ds for fucking up. Oh and lastly and most importantly giving photos, allowing him to be interviewed and so forth.

@Mummyoflittledragon
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?

She is absolutely correct to go to the press with this, and is doing so presumably on the advice of a solicitor.

Perhaps I wasn’t clear. Skin colour should not come into it. I would have said the same thing about any mother in the same situation. BB guns like this are illegal for minors to have in this country.

Instead of owning her part in what happened, she has said skin colour. We know this not to be true as other people on this thread have linked articles of similar treatment of whites. It does not help the very important work of BLM to do this.

Someone posted about being dragged into the toilets for having a brightly coloured toy gun (I think they said they were 15 at the time and not white). For me that is absolutely disgusting and my understanding of racial profiling.

I am sure it was terrifying for all concerned. I don’t believe the boy was at risk of being shot and killed. Firstly weapons are very rarely deployed by the police in this country. Secondly police would do their utmost to use non lethal force. This isn’t the US.

[quote EnoughAlready2020]@CodexDevinchi good for you. When someone reported our white neighbour having a gun, yes armed police turned up and yes they even cordoned the street but they didn't bash down the door and just asked the guy to come to the door with his hands up. Actually this was in Islington just down the road from where this happened. [/quote]
Why is it good for me

Your experience doesn’t cancel out mine. I grew up in a really tough white area and have seen brute force applied on white men, I’ve actually also seen a male police office drag a while women across the road by her hair. Physical assaults, doors being kicked in on white oriole so I will not accept this is just because the lad is black. Sorry if that doesn’t fit your agenda.

See smile he looks much older than all the boys who were in he 7/8 when my ds was that age. The boys didn't seem to look older in general until year 9/10.

The girls however seemed to look much older from day dot of secondary. It one of the reasons that in some sports such as swimming girls are actually faster than boys between 10-12yo.

But he's his nail chewing and looking around could be annoyance at being on TV and discomfort. I accept that. But I read it as cocky and it's possible the person who saw the gun read body language the same way.

But he's not not the cheeky grinning child in the media pictures.

And mum is wrong about racial profiling. She's using buzz words to try and get her point across. He was racially profiled. The police responded to a report from a member of the public.
There is - as you said - a question over whether if the child was white they would have responded differently.

Personally I don't believe they would have.

@SmileEachDay the IOPC oversee police complaints in England and Wales. The PCC, which is the acronym you used stands for Police and Crime Commissioner, they hold the Chief Constable to account.
I don't know why the Met don't have one, but they do have a different structure to other forces and the role of Mayor in London is very different to that in other areas which may go some way to explaining why they don't have one.

We know this not to be true - do we?

I’ll post again:
• Police are five times more likely to use force against Black people than White people.

• In particular, police were 11 times more likely to use firearms (including cases where they were not fired), eight times more likely to use batons and six times more likely to use handcuffs on Black people.

Those stats say we don't know that the level of force had nothing to do with race - which is what the mother has an issue with.

@EnoughAlready2020

Why is it a race thing? Not everything is a race thing........

@C130

We have no way of knowing how he was acting when he had the bb gun. His attitude in the clip has nothing to do with what happened, it is irrelevant. Why bring it up?

Exactly. We have no way of knowing how he was acting when he had the gun.

But what we do know is the photo used in the media isn't a true reflection of the child in question.

That's the point I'm trying to make.

Media bias and intent on spinning an outcome is more influential imo here than whether the police had reports of a black or white man.

I meant the IOPC ChibiTotoro - and you’re right, it’s really irritating when people get acronyms wrong.

Wow, thanks for that link @SmileEachDay. I've watched the interview and I can only say perception is a big deal.

One person sees an arrogant older looking boy with a cocky attitude.

I see a young boy (clearly looks young to me) who's restless, uncomfortable perhaps a bit awkward even, reliving the image of the story his mum's telling the reporter - with frequent pop ups of what looks like a scowl/frown on his face, then back to awkward, uncomfortable, don't quite know what to do with himself/hands/fingers.

Having watched that video, I can say 1. the police did what they could with the information presented.

1. The passerby's 'black male holding a gun' report is questionable. If he was asked to describe the boy male and he mentioned ethnicity, that's different and it wouldn't have been reported as the passerby saying "black male with a gun". He would have given other descriptions as well as ethnicity so the "black male" quote, inferring it's what the passerby said when he made the call, wouldn't have been needed. I still wonder what exactly/more the person said to the police. There's more to it.

1. Now seeing the perspective of the passerby (where s/he stood and saw into the living room) and hearing how the mum described the state of the boy (no shirt, just shorts, etc), then the passerby must have been 'reaching' in order to get the police to investigate what s/he thinks is a real gun, which may be why s/he made the report a bit more serious-sounding.

I can see the gun would look like a real gun from a distance (and the passerby would have thought so) but closely from that video, it looks like a toy.

Stats also show that more black people were killed by black people in the US Than black people were killed by white people
More white people were killed by black people than white people
More white people were killed by police than black people
More police were killed by black people than white people in the US
The actual statistics are readily available to anyone on the CIA website.