A 15-year-old boy has become the first person to be charged with riot over the recent disorder that swept towns and cities across England.
Almost all those involved have so far been charged with violent disorder, which carries a shorter maximum sentence than the offence of rioting. On Wednesday a judge, the recorder of Hull, suggested that prosecutors should consider the riot charge for people alleged to have played a central role in the disorder.
On Thursday the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that a 15-year-old boy had been charged with riot after disorder in Sunderland. It said more riot charges would follow.
The riot charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years, whereas for violent disorder the maximum is five years. The boy’s defence lawyer, Chris Wilson, told a hearing that the new charge may have “far wider repercussions”.
The district judge Zoe Passfield adjourned his case for two weeks as she said the new charge must have come as a “surprise” to him. She told the teenager: “The prosecution now want to bring a further charge of riot.
“It is an unusual situation when a new charge is brought after the person has pleaded guilty and it opens up complications that I and the lawyers need to consider carefully.”
We probably aren’t going to get a simple, coherent narrative out of this but it is too early to tell. The initial rounds of convictions have been the easy ones for general disorder and thievery, which are easy to prove from footage of the incidents (think the lad robbing Greggs, the boy who stole thousands of pounds worth of vapes or the guy rather casually looting Lush). They tend to all be local and it all undermines the comforting story people were telling themselves, that it was largely fascists bussed in for trouble.
However, we are now seeing people charged fir riot and inciting violence on social media, which are likely trickier to prove but come with a much higher sentence. I’d assume they’ll keep working up the chain and we’ll see some fascists prosecuted eventually, it may even be some are done under terror offences.
So it’s still early days and there’s likely a lot to unpick. However, a picture seems to be emerging of the hardcore organising things on Telegram, with it bubbling up to the larger social media platforms thanks to useful idiots and those posts then get jumped on an amplified by bots and troublemakers. Once the location of riots are confirmed and the knowledge is widespread you can have a core of actual fascists, joined by a larger mob of knuckleheads, opportunists and people with nothing to lose. It’s quite a cunning “force multiplier” as you don’t just have to rely on a handful if far right bovver boys and they can make it look like their are a lot more of them than there are.
If you are looking for who to.blame for radicalising this mob, then it is the Tory government who have spent years scapegoating minorities to distract from their lack of funding for pretty much anything that would make a lot of people’s lives better. I doubt they are going to be swept up in this.