Death and despair on London’s murder mile
Camberwell’s latest killing illustrates not only the rising tide of violence but also a growing class divide
WHEN Siddique Kamara was cleared of killing a rival gang member earlier this year, he took the opportunity to speak out about the rising tide of bloodshed blighting the capital.
The 23-year-old drill rap artist, a father-of-one, warned young people to avoid being drawn into the deadly spiral of violence that has seen more than 90 murders in London so far this year.
But on Wednesday evening, as he stood with friends on a street in the south London neighbourhood of Camberwell, not far from the homes of a number of MPS, his name was added to the depressing roll call of victims when he was stabbed to death.
Mr Kamara, who performed with the drill rap outfit Moscow17 under the name Incognito, had been cleared of involvement in the gang-related murder of 17-year-old Abdirahman Mohamed at the Old Bailey in January. Four months later, his friend Rhyhiem Ainsworth-barton, who also performed with Moscow17, was gunned down and killed on the same road – Warham Street – where Mr Kamara and two friends were attacked this week.
The two killings were not isolated incidents. There have been at least five murders within a two-mile radius in the last few months. The past three years have seen almost a dozen murders and attempted murders around Camberwell, Kennington and Peckham, nicknamed London’s new “murder mile” – areas in which a growing number of affluent families and young professionals own or rent homes amid streets dogged by gang violence.
Here, two Londons overlap, the pockets of gentrification nestling within zones of social deprivation. “It’s two different worlds. You’ve got the town houses and you’ve got the estates. It’s quite sad,” says Gloria, 36, at the café she owns on Camberwell New Road, one of the major arteries running through south London.
Warham Street, an unprepossessing residential no-through road and scene of the latest atrocity, sits less than 200 yards from the Lovely gloworm Café, out of sight of the bus routes and flow of pedestrians.
Gloria, who – like many The Daily
Telegraph approached – does not want to give her full name, comes from Peckham and knows the local area well.
“It’s always been a little bit edgy around here,” she reflects. “I thought it was [getting] better, and then you’re reminded it isn’t.”
The premises was burgled last month, the culprits stealing money and her car keys. They subsequently returned and stole her car. “When things like that happen you’re reminded it’s not as nice as you think it is,” she says. But it’s not every day that the more serious violence intrudes into the lives of the better-off locals.
“It’s easy to be in a bit of a bubble around here,” agrees Gloria. Olivia, 22, grew up in Camberwell, the daughter of two middle-class professionals (her mother a doctor, her stepfather an architect). She, too, paints a picture of two separate worlds that “don’t really cross over”. Families such as hers, she says, “live so separately” there’s an uneasy sense of being more or less cos- seted from the problems.
“It feels so close to home – but how close you come to it, you’re not really sure,” she says. So has the area changed? “It’s become much nicer, more gentrified. We were burgled more frequently when I was younger. Camberwell is almost splitting in two now.”
In Brixton and Peckham, the split has been visible for a while. Within the past decade, house prices have shot up, with the number of hipster restaurants and cafés rising accordingly. Camberwell, says Olivia, is a little behind.
But given its proximity to central London, it seems inevitable it will follow the trend. However, the heightened sense of fear among those of all backgrounds is nonetheless palpable. “It’s definitely a concern,” says Olivia. “When the streets are empty, you don’t feel particularly safe.”
Zoe, 30, who lives a mile away in Walworth and works in a primary school, is more forthright. “It’s petrifying,” she says. Her son Michael, 11, is about to start secondary school, but to get there will have to travel through here, a prospect that frightens her. I’m scared of how close [the violence] is getting to my house,” he admits.
Police, meanwhile, say they understand the anxiety of residents and have promised to significantly increase their presence in the area. “This is an extremely troubling incident and I fully appreciate the concerns it will stoke in the immediate vicinity and the surrounding community,” Det Supt Helen Lyon of Southwark borough said yesterday.
Amanda, 47, whose mother-in-law lives on Camberwell New Road, does not feel hopeful. “The police need to be harder on these gangs,” she says. “Personally I think they are scared of them.”
Harriet Harman, MP for Camberwell and Peckham, blamed the internet. She told a packed community meeting last night: “We cannot have the internet to plan and organise crime so the internet companies have got to step up on that.
“I’m going to be asking the Home Affairs committee to look into if we have got enough powers and resources to make sure the internet is not used for criminal activity for gangs.”