City centre shop owners 'intimidated' by youths

3 hours ago

Ed Hanson,in Carlisleand

Federica Bedendo,North East and Cumbria

News image — Joanne Palmer said 20 children refused to leave her shop on one occasion

BBC Joanne Palmer inside her shop Flutter & Fern in Carlisle. She has long dark blond hair and wears large glasses with a brown frame. She is wearing a green baseball cap and a lilac sweater. The shop has walls painted pink and butterflies in frames on the wall. — Joanne Palmer said 20 children refused to leave her shop on one occasion

Shop owners in a city where scores of youths congregated at the weekend said they were facing "intimidating" levels of aggression and have called on police to better manage the issue.

More than 100 youths gathered in Carlisle on Saturday, with reports of stones being thrown, verbal abuse and fighting.

Helen Ryder, who runs Beadle and Hill Jewellers on Scotch Street, said there had been problems for more than a year, while Joanne Palmer said her Flutter & Fern store on Rosemary Lane had been targeted previously.

David Allen, the Labour police and crime commissioner, claimed dispersal orders issued by police were "not a soft touch" despite officers making only one arrest on Saturday.

Ryder said of the large groups: "It's very intimidating, you've got to watch where you're walking.

"You've got to watch what you're saying to them if you do want to tell them to stop doing it, just in case they get annoyed with you and get aggressive."

She said while police had been visibly patrolling the area, especially at weekends, she believed there was more they could do to manage the problem.

Palmer told the BBC the situation had been difficult for some time, claiming her shop had food thrown at the windows from nearby fast food outlets and youths had been intimidating her.

"We did have an incident a while back where we had like 20 kids come in when we were closed," she said.

"They came in and they refused to move."

Although nothing similar had happened since, she said she felt anxious when children entered the shop.

Carlisle Neighbourhood Police A still image from a CCTV camera shows scores of people, male and female, in different groups milling around a street in Carlisle city centre. Police described it as "nearly 60 youths". The street is pedestrianised and almost everyone is looking away from the camera and roughly in the same direction up the street. In the foreground are a couple if people on pushbikes, one of which is a vivid orange colour, but the rest are on foot. — Dispersal orders were implemented in Carlisle at the weekend, but only one arrest was made

Cumbria Police said one teenager was arrested on suspicion of "multiple offences" on Saturday.

Officers also "interviewed" five, with a further four interviews planned.

They called on parents to check what their children were doing and who they associated with.

Police commissioner Allen said a dispersal order was put in place "very quickly", meaning under 16s could be told to leave the area or taken home to their parents.

He said: "It also gives [police] power to arrest individuals should they break that order or refuse to leave and they did that with one of them, so this is not a soft touch."

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