Court orders preventing individuals as young as 12 from
carrying knives are being trialled by the Metropolitan Police.
Court orders preventing young people from carrying knives and
becoming embroiled in serious violence are now being piloted in
London, Home Secretary has announced.
The new Knife Crime Prevention Orders are being trialled by the
Metropolitan Police Service for 14 months, before plans to roll
them out across forces in England and Wales.
They can be imposed on individuals as young as 12 whom police
have reason to believe are carrying knives or are habitual knife
carriers, or those who have been previously convicted of a
knife-related offence.
Police can apply to the courts for the orders. The conditions
attached can include curfews and restrictions on an individual’s
use of social media, travel outside geographical boundaries, as
well as explicitly banning them from carrying a knife.
Courts can also prescribe positive intervention, such as
educational courses, sports club referrals, relationship
counselling, anger management, mentoring and drug rehabilitation.
The orders aim to stop a small but high-risk cohort of
individuals from causing immediate harm to others and support
earlier interventions to turn young people away from a life of
crime and protect them from potential exploitation from criminal
gangs.
Home Secretary said:
One of the hardest parts of my job as Home Secretary is seeing
families ripped apart by the horror of knife crime and I am
determined to stop this misery, protect communities and help
save lives.
Knife Crime Prevention Orders will crack down on those carrying
weapons while at the same time intervening to steer them away
from a life of violence.
Police have asked for these orders to help them keep our
streets and young people safe, and I will always do everything
in my power to ensure they have the tools and powers to cut
crime and protect the public.
Commander Ade Adelekan from the Metropolitan Police Service said:
Knife Crime Prevention Orders will allow police more options
and will be a valuable tactic in preventing and tackling
violence in London.
They will allow intervention at an early stage and divert
vulnerable people at risk of becoming serious criminals by
supporting them to make better lifestyle changes away from
violence. Also, they will enable police to monitor the
individual and enforce the law on them if they breach it. Both
outcomes helping to keep our communities safe.
Tackling violence remains a priority for the Met to which our
officers will continue exploiting all preventative and
enforcement tactics and powers.
Pastor Lorraine Jones, founder of Dwaynamics Boxing Gym in
Brixton, and mother of knife crime victim Dwayne Simpson, said:
These orders are just what we need and are vitally important
for us in the community as we have a number of young people who
carry knives for various reasons in fear.
They will give us greater opportunity to work with young people
and potentially divert them from prison, as they too are
vulnerable at a tender age and at risk of being killed or using
that knife to take a life.
Knife Crime Prevention Orders can be in place for a maximum of
two years and must be reviewed by the courts after 12 months,
with orders issued to under 18s to be reviewed more regularly.
The results of the pilot, which commenced on Monday 5 July, will
be reviewed after 14 months before deciding whether to roll the
orders out to all other forces in England and Wales.
The orders are designed to complement the range of existing
police powers to tackle knife crime, including the existing
offence of possessing a bladed article in public without good
reason and stop and search.
Breaching the order will be a criminal offence punishable by a
maximum prison sentence of two years if convicted.
The government is determined to cut crime and crack down on
serious violence. Knife Crime Prevention Orders will complement
other measures to protect young people including:
- investing £200m in the Youth Endowment Fund to provide
evidence-based solutions to tackling youth violence
- tackling drug crime – since 2019, our County Lines Programme
has resulted in the closure of more than 780 lines, over 5,100
arrests and the safeguarding of more than 1,200 vulnerable people
- introducing a Serious Violence Duty to ensure all parts of
the system – including police, youth offending teams, and health
services – work together to drive down serious violence
We are also recruiting an extra 20,000 police officers by March
2023. Almost 9,000 of these officers have already been recruited,
including an extra 1,369 officers for the Metropolitan Police.
