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Fears for tourists in London as acid attacks escalate in recent weeks
- otp124 9y agoWe recently moved to central-ish London (Zone 1), in a generally safe business area. A few weeks ago my wife & sister were walking home and a man started spraying them with a bottle, screaming "It's raining". Luckily it appeared to be just water. They we're annoyed that they were wet, but now I look at this statistic, and it scares me to think that my family could have been painfully maimed.
- gtirloni 9y agoApparently it's now popular to do weird/stupid stuff to foreigners in public places while recording their reactions then post it online for internet glory.
- tombrossman 9y agoI wonder what percentage of these people end up recording themselves getting their asses kicked instead? Imagine you are in a foreign city and someone sprayed yourself or a loved one with an unknown substance. I'm not talking about a child with a squirt gun innocently playing around, I mean another adult behaving differently from social norms. I have to think the probability of a violent reaction is pretty high.
- cm2187 9y agoAgree. A violent reaction would be justified. It's like mugging someone with a fake gun. The victim has no way to tell whether the gun is fake or whether his life is at risk, and a violent reaction would be legitimate.
- tombrossman 9y agoJust to clarify, a violent reaction (in self defence) might be justified. It's not automatic, and would have to be proportional. For example, it might be enough to simply grab the person and hold them down on the ground until the police arrive unless it quickly became obvious that it was just a harmless prank. If they sprayed you with something harmful, or decide to resist being detained then yes, it may be necessary to use increasing physical force.
- cm2187 9y agoIf someone threatens my life with a gun, there isn't much violence that wouldn't be appropriate.
- BrandoElFollito 9y agoI was attacked twice, with bare fists. I was surprised, terrified and did not act rationally. I also have 15+ years of offensive self-defense training (dojo training). The muscular memory kicked in and I responded to the attack ferociously. I hit him once, twice, three times (blood was splashing around), then finished him with a kick which sent a few of his teeth out. The guy was laying on the floor and yelling as if he was being skinned. I called the police, they came and I explained them that I was attacked and that this was the effect of my defense. They dutifully noted that I was afraid, shocked, terrified, etc. and beside a round to the police station to sign off a paper I never heard about the ceases again. I believe that that the response should be proportionate, but to the clear advantage of the victim. Being hit once and hitting 5 times back - OK. Being slapped and responding by a kick to the body and then another one to the head - OK. Someone attacks you with a knife and you shoot him back with a gun - OK. Being attacked by a 15 yo and hitting him back as if he was an adult - OK All these is defense against unknown and there is no reason to stop before you are safe (you do not know what that person is going to do next). Hitting someone, he is not lying on the floor unconscious and you keep on kicking his head - not OK, there was no more risk. Someone runs away with your bag and you shoot him in the head - not OK, you were not in direct danger. What I want to say is that the proportionality should have a 10x factor in favour of the victim.
- dazc 9y agoIn the UK, reacting violently to any kind of attack is very likely to result in you being prosecuted for assault. If anyone is wondering why anti-social behaviour and minor criminality is now so common here it is not that decent people don't want to do anything about it, it is because the Police are often perceived to be on the same side of the assailants.
- Symbiote 9y agoI've downvoted this, since without any statistics to back it up, it's merely repetition of a common, unsubstantiated right-wing meme. A search along the lines of "arrested assault robber" shows many cases reported in the Daily Mail, Sun, Mirror etc where the opposite happened, but only a single case where the bystander was arrested -- in that case, because the robber died [1]. Anti-social behaviour and minor criminality is the result of decades of underinvestement in education, regions outside London, austerity and an unbalanced economy [2]. [1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/16/have-a-go-hero-arrested-death-suspected-armed-robber-tackled/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/16/have-a-go-hero-ar... [2] https://www.theguardian.com/society https://www.theguardian.com/society :-)
- matthewmacleod 9y agoThanks. The statement is indeed totally without merit. I’m surprised about the number of ill-informed comments on this issue.
- dazc 9y agoAnti-social behaviour and minor criminality is the result of decades of underinvestement in education, regions outside London, austerity and an unbalanced economy [2]. Ill informed leftist ideology trumps unsubstantiated right-wing meme thanks to a random Guardian link.
- Jabanga 9y agoI love how "austerity" is the catch all cause of all social problems, despite social welfare spending as a share of GDP massively increasing in the UK over the last 50 years.
- collyw 9y agoGetting their asses kicked gets them more hits, so some young youtubers actually aim for that. Though I am never sure how many of them are fake.
- exergy 9y agoNot even thirty, but every day I understand the world less and less.
- JetSpiegel 9y agoI'm getting flashbacks to Nathan Barley...
- dan1234 9y agoDoes anyone have a link to the data (which is only mentioned once in the article).
- DanBC 9y agoI strongly agree that journalists should link to their sources of data. It seems these figures were "obtained by BBC" through FoI request, not part of normal Met Police data sets. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-39328233 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-39328233 Here's an older FoI request, but it might not be the one the BBC are talking about: https://beta.met.police.uk/globalassets/foi-media/disclosure_2017/january_2017/information-rights-unit---acidammoniaother-noxious-substance-attacks-over-the-past-5-years https://beta.met.police.uk/globalassets/foi-media/disclosure... UK crime statistics come in two forms. 1) Police records, which is what this article is talking about. In general these are not seen as statistically robust because they rely on people reporting a crime to the police, and the police recording it. Police forces have improved their recording in recent years. Here's a link to the Met Police stats: https://beta.met.police.uk/stats-and-data/ https://beta.met.police.uk/stats-and-data/ Here's a link to press release: http://news.met.police.uk/news/crime-statistics-for-2016-to-2017-235111 http://news.met.police.uk/news/crime-statistics-for-2016-to-... 2) Office for National Statistics. These use a crime survey, and are seen as reliable.
- DanBC 9y agoForgot to include the ONS link! Here it is: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeand...
- junkculture 9y agoIs this peculiar to London or do other places in the UK have the same problem?
- irremediable 9y agoSo far it seems pretty peculiar to London (at least within the UK). Of course, London is a huge part of the UK: something like 10% of our population live here.
- sprash 9y agoThis is a Pakistani Muslim problem. So avoid bigger cities. I lived for 10 months in Birmingham, I had to leave because even though I'm a grown man I could not tolerate the terror of people throwing rocks at your window at night. Besides the area around the main Concert Hall there is no particular "British" culture left in that city and acid attacks are definitely not done by local Brits. Nobody says anything because they are scared to be labeled as racists. It's a shame.
- sumedh 9y ago> I could not tolerate the terror of people throwing rocks at your window at night. Why, maybe to drive you out of the area?
- clarabrooks 9y agoSome months ago, my mom needed money to purchase our apartment but she couldn't afford to get a loan as her credit score was low and this was so painful but luckily enough, after explaining the situation to my friend he introduced me to a very good hacker who then assisted her in boosting her credit score. A problem shared is truly half solved so don't hesitate to contact him cybershiff@gmail.com
- foop2 9y agoThat is bullshit there are plenty of areas in Birmingham that have equally scummy white people in them. Also if people are throwing rocks at you, you are def in the wrong area, it's a city there are some places you can't go, it's a bit like walking through inner city LA and being surprised you got robbed.
- MichaelGG 9y agoOdd/interesting that they don't mention motives. They give one example of using acid to commit a mugging. Yet[1] seems to state that acid attacks are mostly male-on-female violence for relationships/shame issues. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid_throwing#Epidemiology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid_throwing#Epidemiology So it is a real threat to tourists? It's like when you hear about high crime in some area, but it's mostly gang members killing each other -- it's a somewhat irrelevant statistic for tourists. London should release demographics on who is doing this to whom.
- barrkel 9y ago80% male, both perpetrators and victims: http://www.barkinganddagenhampost.co.uk/news/crime-court/east-london-named-as-acid-attack-hotspot-and-a-third-of-victims-are-asian-1-5115133 http://www.barkinganddagenhampost.co.uk/news/crime-court/eas... At this point it's mostly gang on gang, and probably driven by anti-knife enforcement. Scooter riders snatching phones are a bigger threat to tourists. The two have been combined recently though, using scooter + acid to hijack and steal other scooters and bikes. This in turn is driven by police not chasing two wheeled vehicles due to danger to riders, and pretty much ignoring motorcycle theft. Scooter crime is up 600% since 2015 and motorcycle theft was up 44% in 2016 over 2015. If you're not riding a bike and you don't have your phone in your hand, you're not at significant risk. I've had 5 scooters stolen from me in the past 8 years though.
- zkms 9y agoDoes this represent a sui generis rise of violence or is this the result of substitution of weapons to commit crimes (like mugging, say) that were already happening?
- evgen 9y agoThe latter. After a "scourge" of knife crime that reached the level of almost one death a week (mostly gang-related) the city cracked down on knife crimes and arrests for possession of same. This is the substitution that carries with it a slight bit of anti-immigrant dog whistle given some previous high-profile cases of acid attacks being used in "honour" crimes against women.
- krona 9y agoCarrying a knife in a public area is generally illegal, whereas a bottle of something that looks like water in a casual inspection isn't sufficient grounds for concern. Also, the use of police stop and search powers have fallen dramatically in the past year because of a concern over ethic bias in the statistics. An offensive weapon is any article made or adapted for use for causing injury to the person, or intended by the person having it with him for such use by him or by some other person.
- acdjuiamadfn 9y agoAre there any patterns in the data? I'd like to find out: 1) If these are people who have commited a crime before 2) Were raised in certain cultures/locations 3) Are gangs
- novalis78 9y agoNever heard of 'acid attacks' in my life (kid of the 80s, teen of the 90s) before reading about the beautiful culture of Pakistan (2001 and after). It seems London cloned its own mini-version. Horrific.
- raverbashing 9y agoAh, "Cultural enrichment" it seems. (do keep the good qualities but deport the criminals)
- sattoshi 9y agoI already feel stronger with all this diversity
- toyg 9y agoIt happens in Italy as well, no pakistani required. It's just the new low-tech stealth attack weapon for the streets.
- dagaci 9y agoAcid attacks are mostly related to business disputes, sex, marriage, robbery and honor disputes. The stats and location's where the acid attacks take place: https://www.statista.com/chart/10289/acid-attacks-in-london/ https://www.statista.com/chart/10289/acid-attacks-in-london/ and https://www.met.police.uk/globalassets/foi-media/disclosure_2017/may_2017/information-rights-unit--acid-attacks-recorded-by-the-mps-during-2015-to-april-2017-calendar-years#page=5&zoom=90,-7,719 https://www.met.police.uk/globalassets/foi-media/disclosure_...
- btb 9y agoThanks, googled those top 3 trouble spots mentioned and they all seem to be in east london.
- sinaa 9y agoThanks for the links. What scares me is that over 1/3 of incidents were marked as "Investigation complete; no suspect identified". And only 18% of attacks (156/833) resulted in a "Charged/Summoned" outcome.
- kyrre 9y agoBan guns, ban bread knives, ... London has fallen. Glad I left three years ago.
- matthewmacleod 9y agoThis is mince. Knives were banned because of an surge in knife crime. Guns have obviously been banned for an age. I suspect you have an ulterior motive.
- sattoshi 9y agoI think he is highlighting that the problem is not the weapons but rather the people wielding them. These people will use the next best thing and the bans only really affect law abiding citizens.
- futurix 9y agoIf the ban would only affect law abiding citizens, then why aren't the criminals described here using already banned knives or guns?
- sattoshi 9y agoI think I expressed myself poorly. They aren't using banned things because they are banned. Instead, they go the easier route of killing people with non-banned things.
- DanBC 9y agogun murders per million people UK: 0.236 gun murders per million people US: 32.57 I dunno, that feels like it's working.
- ddxxdd 9y agoI read a statistic stating that somewhere around 80% of the violent crime in America takes place in about 5% of the counties. In other words, there are certain niche demographics in America that are pulling up those gun murder stats, and it's generally not a problem for most people who enjoy 2nd Amendment protections.
- weinzierl 9y ago> "Bystanders who come to the aid of the victim of an attack can have an important role in minimising further injury," [..] > They urged bystanders to remove victims from exposure as soon as possible and apply "copious" amounts of water on the affected area, "to minimize the long-term effects of scarring and need for surgical reconstruction." The "'copious' amounts of water on the affected area" part can't be stressed enough and also that the victim is likely too shocked to do this themselves. Also, try to not get any acid in your mouth and avoid to swallow it under any circumstances. I attended a talk by Katie Piper[1] last year and someone asked her what her first reaction was after the attack happened. She said that she looked down her body and saw her clothes dissolving and her first worry was that people could see her naked. She also said the the attack took place in a busy street [2] but it took a long time until anyone helped her. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katie_Piper https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katie_Piper [2] I think she said High Street in her talk but Wikipedia disagrees.
- devwastaken 9y agoAnyone know if it would be possible to neutralize an acid attack in a sprayable fashion with baking soda?/stabilizer?, like the opposite of pepper spray that bystanders can use since water isn't always accessible?
- XorNot 9y agoThis is extremely likely to cause severe burns from the heat of reaction. Neutralizing strong acids is a violent high temperature reaction (in chemistry labs the biggest danger is you flash boil the solution / generate a bunch of gas and it explodes onto you). Water - a lot of water - is the best answer.
- arkades 9y agoI want to second that this is the correct answer. It's really common in chem labs for some grad student to immediately think "neutralize!" And it's always wrong: neutralizing releases a lot of heat, and just makes things worse. Water, water, and water are always the correct response. This can't be stressed enough. If you think you've washed long enough, good, you're a quarter of the way there.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]