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PICKNICKERS HIT BY X-RAY CRACKDOWN
Royal Park caught up in ‘absurd’ knife crime operation
PICNICKERS at the borough’s most fashionable beauty spot were subjected to police searches and made to walk through a metal detecting arch.
In a move described as both “absurd” and “a very good thing” by a divided community, Royal Parks police deployed a metal detecting “search arch” on the gate of Primrose Hill for two hours on Sunday as part of a London-wide crackdown on youth knife crime.
“I’ve never seen such an idiotic waste of money and police time, or a strategy more calculated to do the terrorists’ job for them,” said Simon Jenkins, the knighted Guardian columnist and former Times editor.
He described how his teenaged guests had been through the arch during its 3-5pm installation on Sunday at the southern entrance to the park.
“It’s quite absurd,” added Mr Jenkins. “I have never known anyone to be stabbed in the park. People are mugged there, however, and it would be quite nice if the Parks police were seen patrolling the park, rather than sitting in their car on the top of Primrose Hill, admiring the view.”
But chairman of the Regent’s Park and Primrose Hill residents association Malcolm Kafetz welcomed the police move.
He said: “Its all very well talking about personal liberties but Primrose Hill is a dangerous area. They caught someone carrying drugs and they stopped anyone with knives going in. If this stops knife crime, quite frankly I think it is a good thing.”
The operation also had support from the area’s politicians. Camden and Primrose Hill councillor Libby Campbell said:”People understand that you have to put up with these things if you want to deter the sort of crime we have seen recently, with a young man murdered in Camden Town. As someone who lives in Camden Town I like it when there are sniffer dogs or searches.”
A spokesman for the Met unit dedicated to London’s Royal Parks said the operation was a ‘one-off’, designed to support the London-wide campaign against youth knife crime, Operation Blunt2. Seven people had been searched and one man arrested on suspicion of possessing class A drugs on Sunday, he said.
?Primrose Hill Residents Association, Malcolm Kafetz, welcomed the police operation.
He said: “It’s all very well talking about personal liberties, but Primrose Hill is a dangerous area. They caught someone carrying drugs and they stopped anyone with knives going in. If this stops knife crime, quite frankly I think it is a good thing.”
The operation also won support from the area’s politicians. Camden and Primrose Hill councillor Libby Campbell said: “People understand that you have to put up with these things if you want to deter the sort of crime we have seen recently, with a young man murdered in Camden Town.”
A spokesman for the Met unit dedicated to London’s Royal Parks said the operation was a “one-off” to support the capital’s campaign against youth knife crime, Operation Blunt2.
One man was arrested on suspicion of possessing class A drugs on Sunday, he said.
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