In reply to the comments about the west midlands: in the UK almost all private possestion of firearms or even air guns, airsoft, pellet and BB guns are outlawed. Yet gun crimes, while much lower than in the US are "skyrocketing" with a 27% increase this last year alone, primarily in multicultural London and other large cities. Knife and "sharp object" crime is rising at a similar rate.
There are parts of the UK, mostly the "multicultural" communities where the police barely operate, frequently token drive through's most of the time. Sometimes the police even refuse to do anything when video proof is brought them. An example is the recent refusal to even enter a Travellers camp (their version of Gypsies) to investigate the possession of a stolen caravan (travel trailer) even when the owner had video and photographic proof of its location there. It was "too dangerous for the police to enter". These camps are frequently squatting on private land without permission and the more urban police forces rarely even try to move them.
The frequency of teen rape is so high that, so long as they aren't seriously injured, many teen girls don't report it, accepting it as part of growing up. There are several news stories in the last year about teenager girls being raped multiple times in separate incidents in the course of a single night.
Few British police carry weapons and the ones that do have to carry them in a zipped and, I believe, locked case. By the time they can get a weapon out it's frequently much too late.
It's gotten to the point that the UK police departments are having a hard time recruiting officers and most departments are very undermanned. They're even pulling their Motorway cops (their equivalent to the Highway Patrol) in to urban areas to handle theft, assault, and other non-vehicle crimes rather than patrolling the highways.
This gives a little fuller picture of why there are so few police using guns and its consequences. Where was it that just a few years ago that an off duty soldier in uniform was butchered with a machete and axe on a busy city street in broad daylight and no one would or could do anything to stop it, they just videoed it.
Sorry for the rant. |
Show Media Item - Yet another school shooting. But the only death this time...
