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Tamara Adair, Francisco da Silva, Andreas Schoyen and Bridget Anderson |
The red berets who want to help make our streets safer
Guardian Angels to hold ‘stay safe, street smart’ classes in basic but effective self-defence
NEW York-style Guardian Angels came to Holloway on Monday to share their “people policing” tactics with residents.
Donning their trademark red berets and working under the tagline “we dare to care”, members of the UK Guardian Angels held a “stay safe, street smart” evening at Hilldrop Community Centre, Community Lane, to give residents a taste of future courses planned for the centre.
The Guardian Angels first formed in 1979 as a volunteer citizens force trained to combat crime on New York subways but has since expanded worldwide.
UK national director Andreas Schoyen showed visitors how to evade a baseball bat attack and how to disarm knife-wielding criminals.
Tamara Adair, who lives in Hilldrop and is about to become Mr Schoyen’s assistant, first got involved with the Guardian Angels 12 years ago.
She said: “My son was five. I was about to go on a train in King’s Cross and he clocked the Angels and asked if he could talk to them.
“They invited us to their meetings in King’s Cross. I watched the training sessions. In the first 20 minutes I learned how to disarm someone with a blade in three different ways without hurting myself or them.”
The Guardian Angels don’t have an Islington group yet but plan to run courses for young people and over-50s in the borough next year. When they can, they bring patrols to the borough.
Ms Adair said: “On one of my very first patrols of the Marquess Estate in Canonbury, there were approximately 80 to 90 youths throwing bricks and bottles, aiming to hurt each other. We were called by a resident. We came and stood on the corner between them. Not one stick came near us. The whole thing simmered down. The young people came to thank us afterwards.”
As a member of the Angels, Ms Adair has learned law, emergency aid, baseball bat evasion, confrontation and weapons negotiation, and how to talk someone down from suicide.
She said: “If someone’s threatening you with a baseball bat you just grab it and throw it. What we get taught is simple but extremely effective.”
She added: “We work within three legal systems. The law states you can use reasonable amount of force – we use minimal force.
“Not one member has ever incurred a civil liability suit or been convicted of any offence against a person but six members have died protecting people they would otherwise never have met.
“In or out of their colours, any Angel would put their life down on the line for you.”
But when asked what she says to criticisms that the Angels are nothing more than vigilantes, Ms Adair said: “We don’t use the ‘V’ word. No one can patrol the streets all of the time. We’re just there to fill in the gaps.” |
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