Another Stabbing In Walthamstow As Spate Of Violence Stuns London

Walthamstow MP writes to the Home Secretary to 'urgently request' extra support for local police and youth services.
|
Open Image Modal
Flowers are left at the scene following the death of Amaan Shakoor who was shot on Monday night in Walthamstow, east London
PA Wire/PA Images

A man has been stabbed in Walthamstow, the Metropolitan Police have confirmed, amid a spate of violence in London. 

The stabbing follows seven violent deaths in the capital since Friday, including a fatal shooting on Monday in the same east London borough.

The man in his 20s was injured on Billet Road at around 12.50pm on Thursday. 

He has been taken to hospital and is now in a stable condition, a police spokesman said. 

It comes after a 16-year-old boy, named as Amaan Shakoor, was found on Monday with bullet wounds in Walthamstow and died on Tuesday night.

Two people, including an 18-year-old man, were murdered in the borough of Hackney on Wednesday night.

Local Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy has written to Home Secretary Amber Rudd to “urgently request” extra support for local police and youth services, following the latest string of violence in the capital.

Creasy also called for an urgent investigation into how “firearms have become easily accessible to young children in our city”. 

The former shadow minister for home affairs said she wanted police and youth workers to address the underlying causes of the attacks, but argued that governmental cuts had led to struggling support services which “help engage young residents in positive activities”.

She added: “I fear this shocking spate of incidents may continue without investment to support both police and youth service provision required to build relationships with the local community and younger residents to help disrupt these activities and encourage them to make positive life choices.”

Shakoor died after being shot in the face in a case of “mistaken identity” was “in the wrong place at the wrong time”, a family friend said.

Open Image Modal
Amaan Shakoor, 16, was found on Monday with bullet wounds in Walthamstow and died on Tuesday night.
PA

Speaking outside the scene of the shooting at Walthamstow Leisure Centre, a man who gave his name only as Osman, 32, said of Shakoor: “He was just a good lad. He wasn’t involved in gangs or drugs or anything like that.

“It was a case of mistaken identity. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“There are gang wars going on and this young lad has just unfortunately got caught up in it.

“He was in his last year at school studying for his GCSEs. He had his whole future ahead of him.”

The 18-year-old man killed in Hackney on Wednesday was named by his father as Israel Ogunsola.

He was Facebook friends with Tanesha Melbourne, 17, who was fatally shot in a drive-by shooting on Monday.

Another man, 53, was found unconscious in a bookmakers in Clapton, Hackney on Wednesday and died at the scene.

Police believe he had had an “altercation” there with someone else who then left.

There is no evidence to suggest the two killings in Hackney were linked.