EXTENSIVE stop and search powers were enacted across Hackney by the Metropolitan Police this weekend, in an effort to prevent a worsening of London’s knife crime epidemic.
Two section 60 orders were authorised by senior officers – spanning Friday evening into Saturday morning, and Saturday night into Sunday morning – allowing police to search members of the public without evidence or prior suspicion.
Section 60 stop and searches can only be sanctioned by a senior police officer when there is a reasonable belief that violence has or is about to occur.
No stabbings were reported in the borough while the section 60 orders were in action.
Twelve borough-wide and 27 localised section 60 orders were enacted in Hackney in 2018, the second-highest figure in London after Newham.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has called on the government to pour more funding into the fight against knife crime. Police forces in England and Wales have lost nearly 20,000 officers since 2010.
On Saturday, Nathaniel Armstrong, a 29-year-old engineering graduate, became the 26th person to die in London from a stabbing in 2019, after he was fatally stabbed on a street in Fulham.
