Just four gang injunctions put in place since powers introduced: report

County courts have put in place just four gang injunctions since the new powers were introduced in January this year, according to The Times.

The newspaper said only two police forces – the Metropolitan Police and Avon & Somerset – had made use of this type of injunction.

The orders mean that people can be barred from entering a certain geographical area, being in public with a particular species of animal, and wearing certain ‘gang colours’ in public. They can also be required to participate in positive activities such as being mentored.

However, gang injunctions currently only apply to individuals aged 18 and over. The Home Office has said they will be brought in for 14 to 17 year olds by the end of 2011.

The Times suggested that councils and police forces were being put off using injunctions because of the expense involved compared to obtaining other types of anti-social behaviour order.

It cited a council source saying that gang injunctions cost almost twice as much as ASBOs because they required lawyers, rather than in-house staff, to apply to the county court.

The paper also said that magistrates had been sceptical about the need for some injunctions and had called for “great swathes of evidence of wrongdoing”.

Last month 19-year-old Dylan Martin of Edmonton was given a suspended prison sentence after he broke the terms of his gang injunction seven times in four months.

In March the London Borough of Southwark was the first council to obtain a gang injunction, against an individual seen celebrating gang culture on videos uploaded to YouTube.

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