England: "Ludicrous" round-up of children

Civil rights campaign Liberty sharply criticised as "ludicrous" a police 
round-up of three children who were playing games in the street with a 
plastic toy gun.

The 12-year-old children were arrested near their homes by five officers 
who screeched to a halt in three panda cars.

The trio of playmates were taken to a police station and fingerprinted. 
Then the police took DNA samples.

They were given an official reprimand by a senior police officer, which 
will stay on their record for a three-year period, while their DNA and 
fingerprints will stay on file for life.

Police blamed new tighter government regulations which forced them to treat 
the incident as a crime.

Parents said that the youngsters, one girl and two boys, had been playing a 
James Bond game indoors on a games console before they decided to act out 
the game near their homes.

"All they were doing was playing a cops and robbers-type game like people 
have done for years", said the girl's father.

Liberty campaigns director Mark Littlewood said that it was "ludicrous to 
criminalise young children playing cops and robbers and make it an offence 
that is going to involve police cars and DNA samples and severe 
reprimands".

Mr Littlewood said that it was "madness" to treat children's games in the 
same way as real robbers going into a building society with a fake gun.

The three children, who have not been named, were playing in the back 
streets in Ashington, Northumberland, last month.

Police told them to lay down the weapon, a black plastic gun bought for L3 
[$9] at the town market, before taking them to Bedlington police station.

The girl was locked in a cell until her parents arrived. Her father, a 
retired miner, said: "It was handled all wrong and was very traumatic for 
her".

"If the authorities are so concerned about it, why don't they stop people 
selling the guns in the first place?" he asked.

Chief Inspector Graham Davis of Bedlington police said that two officers in 
a patrol car had seen a boy with a pistol chasing a girl.

Two elderly pensioners looked on in horror, he said.

The officers called for back-up before confronting the children, since they 
could not tell whether the gun was genuine or not.

* * *

Morning Star, Britain's socialist daily.