Man charged with Keith Blakelock murder...
Posted: Tue Jul 23, 2013 1:02 pm
I thought this case would never be solved, the murder of PC Keith Blakelock who was murdered in the Broadwater Farm riot in London in 1985. I remember when this happened, I was a teenager living with my family a few miles away, and I remember it lead to the biggest manhunt in history. Over 1,000 officers on the case. The guy they've charged is 44 years old which means he was 16 when it happened. I wonder if it will be argued that he was below the age of criminal responsibility at the time. I remember there was a "wall of silence" in Tottenham after it happened and the Police could procure few leads.
From memory, the events of that night went like this: major rioting took place on the Broadwater Farm Estate in Tottenham following a person dying during a Police raid on a house. The rioters that night were amongst the most savage I've ever heard of in British history, a group of Firemen (not Police) were lured to a dark corner of the Estate so that machete wielding nutters could attack them. PC Blakelock and his colleague went to help. Blakelock's colleague was wearing a stronger helmet than he was and that saved his life. His colleague was hit over the head so hard with a machete that when he got back to the Police station later that evening and he took his helmet off it fell into two pieces like an easter egg. That would have been his head, but for the helmet.
Blakelock was stabbed so many times and murdered. His Police jacket is hanging in the Police Crime Museum and apparently has yellow tape stuck next to every knife slit in it. There are so many that the jacket is almost completely yellow, you can barely see any of the original colour of it, which was black.
Fast-forward 26 years to the riots of 2011 and I remember someone from Tottenham being interviewed on TV after that area had gone up in flames (again). He said "last time we rioted they spent huge amounts of money refurbishing the estate and they built us a new swimming pool complex. I wonder what we'll get this time". It's great how communities are rewarded for doing bad things, isn't it? If I had my way people who riot who have to pay for the repairs themselves, and if that meant working for 10 years, doing 50 or 60 hours a week in a menial job, and all but the bare essential living money taken from them to go towards the repair bill, then so be it.
Anyway, they've got someone for it now. With all the sensitivity around this case, and how Winston Silcott was wrongly banged-up for it previously, I doubt they would have charged anyone without thinking they were sure he was guilty.
If you go to Muswell Hill in north London there is a small commerative monument for PC Keith Blakelock which I have seen, and it mentions how he used to patrol in that area. As a nice footnote to this horrible tale, Keith Blakelock's son grew up and became a Policeman, even though his father was killed doing it.
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From memory, the events of that night went like this: major rioting took place on the Broadwater Farm Estate in Tottenham following a person dying during a Police raid on a house. The rioters that night were amongst the most savage I've ever heard of in British history, a group of Firemen (not Police) were lured to a dark corner of the Estate so that machete wielding nutters could attack them. PC Blakelock and his colleague went to help. Blakelock's colleague was wearing a stronger helmet than he was and that saved his life. His colleague was hit over the head so hard with a machete that when he got back to the Police station later that evening and he took his helmet off it fell into two pieces like an easter egg. That would have been his head, but for the helmet.
Blakelock was stabbed so many times and murdered. His Police jacket is hanging in the Police Crime Museum and apparently has yellow tape stuck next to every knife slit in it. There are so many that the jacket is almost completely yellow, you can barely see any of the original colour of it, which was black.
Fast-forward 26 years to the riots of 2011 and I remember someone from Tottenham being interviewed on TV after that area had gone up in flames (again). He said "last time we rioted they spent huge amounts of money refurbishing the estate and they built us a new swimming pool complex. I wonder what we'll get this time". It's great how communities are rewarded for doing bad things, isn't it? If I had my way people who riot who have to pay for the repairs themselves, and if that meant working for 10 years, doing 50 or 60 hours a week in a menial job, and all but the bare essential living money taken from them to go towards the repair bill, then so be it.
Anyway, they've got someone for it now. With all the sensitivity around this case, and how Winston Silcott was wrongly banged-up for it previously, I doubt they would have charged anyone without thinking they were sure he was guilty.
If you go to Muswell Hill in north London there is a small commerative monument for PC Keith Blakelock which I have seen, and it mentions how he used to patrol in that area. As a nice footnote to this horrible tale, Keith Blakelock's son grew up and became a Policeman, even though his father was killed doing it.
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