Cash boost for efforts to curb city shootings
A SUCCESSFUL operation to curb shootings has been given extra government cash.
Operation Naseby, launched in April last year, was meant to run for six weeks in Salford.
But after 18 months it has resulted in a 60 per cent drop in shootings and a major disruption of organised crime in the city with 21 people being recalled to prison.
GMP and the council have been determined to tackle gun crime which continues to tarnish the city’s reputation despite being committed by a small number of criminals.
Getting into the faces of suspects by stopping them in their vehicles and being in hotspots for shootings has enabled police to plug a gap in intelligence gathering. But the use of firearms remains an issue in the city.
The taskforce was set up after 26 firearms discharges, mostly involving a series of violent incidents between two rival criminal groups, had taken place in Salford during the previous 12 months.
More than 30 officers - including detectives, complex safeguarding officers, neighbourhood patrols, and pursuit-trained officers - proactively targeted and tackled offenders suspected of being involved in organised crime.
The team has made 233 arrests, 239 vehicle seizures, the recovered £500,000 worth of drugs, and searched more than 100 homes linked to individuals involved in crime. Weapons recovered have included a loaded handgun, a shotgun, two loaded crossbows, a number of machetes and dozens of other knives and bladed articles.
Twenty-one people have been recalled to prison, and numerous other offenders have been convicted of a range of drug, driving, and firearms offences, including several targets from the outset of the operation.
Due to a backlog of court cases due to the pandemic, a number of further cases are currently waiting to be heard.
In the last six months, five firearms discharges have been recorded – down from 15 during the six months before the operation began – and are set to continue the downward trend after 26 shootings in 2019-20 and 15 in 2020-21.
Now, an extra £95,000 has been allocated by GMP and the Home Office to fund the district’s crackdown on criminal groups for at least a further six months.
Resources from GMP’s Serious and Organised Crime Group, and Specialist Operations Unit will also continue to assist.
The team have worked with local agencies across Salford to safeguard vulnerable adults and children, and with Salford city council on diverting young people away from crime.