Gangs are exploiting girls to foil stop and search, claims charity

YOUNG women should be stopped and searched more frequently as gangs exploit police “loopholes” to force girls to carry weapons and drugs, a charity leader has warned.

Lucy Martindale, director of Operation Shutdown, a charity for young offenders, said officers were often reluctant to search female suspects through fear of being accused of inappropriate touching.

Ms Martindale said “dominant” males were getting more confident in using girls to hide weapons as statistically they were far less likely to be searched.

She said that increased stop-andsearch powers would mean girls recruited by gangs could be offered support when they became known to the police – in the same way that raids on “county lines” houses yielded vulnerable young people.

“A lot are being made to carry weapons and drugs but because they are not being stopped it can go undetected,” she said. “It is making females easy targets for those gangs.”

Ms Martindale, herself recruited into a gang when she was a teenager, said she was regularly pressurised into holding weapons for older men. She

‘They are smarter than you think: 10-year-olds are now carrying weapons – who’s going to stop a 10-year-old?’

was just nine when she watched her cousin die after he was stabbed in the head with a screwdriver in Brixton.

She said extra resources, including more female police officers to search girls, would help tackle the problem.

Politicians are also calling for more funds to go into early intervention schemes to support vulnerable females, as it was revealed more than 1,000 women and girls were at risk of “gang association” in London.

The figures come as other charities warn that children as young as 10 are being used by gangs to carry weapons as they are even less likely to be stopped.

Sheldon Thomas, 55, a former gang member who now runs the Gangsline anti-violence charity, said: “Gangs are smarter than some people think. Tenyear-olds are carrying weapons now – who’s going to stop a 10-year-old? They realise police are catching on to girls being stopped and searched.”

In March last year, Sajid Javid as home secretary overturned reforms made by Theresa May, thus enabling officers in seven regions to step up the use of the controversial stop-andsearch tactic where it was feared there was a likelihood of serious violence.

However, there were still concerns that the tactic unfairly targeted people who are black or from other minority ethnic groups.