Community rallies together after ‘people from out of town’ riot in Southport

Dozens of residents were outside Southport mosque with brushes and shovels on Wednesday morning, after violent protests that saw bricks, stones and bottles thrown at police and cars set alight.

Norman Wallis, chief executive of Southport Pleasureland, said people had travelled from out of town to wreak havoc, leaving locals to clean up the mess.

Mosque chairman Ibrahim Hussein told reporters he was trapped in the mosque with about eight others as the violence erupted, and only escaped with a police guard.

He said: “It was terrifying. It was absolutely, awful, horrendous. We couldn’t understand this viciousness that was going on.”

Locals have brought flowers to the mosque and are helping organise repairs to the building, which Mr Hussein said was “humbling”.

“I know the people of Southport and I know how beautiful they are but this was still a moving experience to see all that,” he said.

Shop owner Chanaka Balasuryla said the Southport community has rallied around him since his store was looted during the disorder on Tuesday night.

Mr Balasuryla said he called 999 after spotting men trying to smash their way in on the CCTV camera from his home five minutes away.

He said he was “terrified” when he thought they would set fire to the premises because there is a woman and her daughter living in a flat above.

He said he later found out that the woman confronted the raiders, telling them it was her shop in an attempt to stop them.

“I got a couple of hours’ sleep and then got a phone call saying ‘You need to come down, there’s lots of people waiting to help’,” Mr Balasuryla said.

He added that local people had said they would defend his shop if necessary.

“It was terrifying last night,” he said.

“But I feel safe again because people are here to protect us.”

Police officers suffered serious injuries when bricks, stones and bottles were thrown and cars were set alight during violent protests following a vigil for three girls killed in a knife attack at a Taylor Swift-themed holiday club.

Alice Dasilva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, were all fatally stabbed in Southport on Monday, while a 17-year-old boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons because of his age, remains in custody accused of murder and attempted murder.

Mr Wallis, who was helping at the junction of Sussex Road and St Luke’s Road on Wednesday, said volunteers joined the clean-up partly in response to a social media plea he put out after witnessing the violence on Tuesday evening.

He added: “It’s horrendous what those hooligans have done last night.

“It was like a war scene. People from out of town just causing absolute mayhem.

“People in hoods climbing up lampposts, throwing bricks, they set a police car on fire.

“But none of those people were the people of Southport. The people of Southport are the ones here today cleaning the mess up.

“Those people from out of town – they came in in buses and cars and had a change of clothes. They just started to riot and do this.”

Merseyside Police said “a large group of people – believed to be supporters of the English Defence League” – began to throw items such as bricks towards the mosque in the seaside town at about 7.45pm.

Scotland’s former first minister Humza Yousaf called for the EDL to be banned under terror laws in the wake of the unrest, despite former leader Tommy Robinson’s insistence that the group no longer exists.

Officers put on helmets and riot gear after stones and bottles were launched at them and police vehicles were damaged and set on fire.

In a post on social media, the force said shops had been “broken into and looted”, adding that “those responsible will be brought to justice”.

Elsie’s mother, Jenni Stancombe, wrote on Facebook: “This is the only thing that I will write, but please please stop the violence in Southport tonight.

“The police have been nothing but heroic these last 24 hours and they and we don’t need this.”

The troubling scenes saw 27 officers taken to hospital, with 12 others being treated and discharged at the scene, North West Ambulance Service said.

Merseyside Police said eight officers suffered serious injuries including fractures, lacerations, a suspected broken nose and concussion.

Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said the officers injured in Tuesday’s protests will “now be unavailable for duty in what is an incredibly busy time for the force”.

Videos posted on social media showed people throwing wheelie bins and bricks at officers who held riot shields to push the crowds back.

The chairman of Merseyside Police Federation, Chris McGlade, said more than 50 officers had been hurt in a “sustained and vicious attack”.

He added: “Police officers are not robots. We are mothers and fathers. Sons and daughters. Husbands, wives and partners.

“We should be going home at the end of our shifts. Not to hospital.”

The violent protests followed hundreds of people taking part in a peaceful vigil for the stabbing victims outside Southport’s Atkinson arts venue, with many in tears as they laid flowers and cards of remembrance.

As well as the three children who died, eight other youngsters suffered stab wounds and five are in a critical condition, alongside two adults who were also critically injured, police said.

The vigil was followed by the protest outside the mosque as demonstrators chanted far-right slogans and clashed with police in St Luke’s Road.

Southport MP Patrick Hurley, speaking on Wednesday, said rioters must face the “full force of the law”, saying they were “utterly disrespecting the families of the dead and injured children”.

He condemned “beered-up thugs” who threw bricks, telling BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “Even if this lad, the 17-year-old, turns out to be Muslim, under no circumstances does that justify any attack on a mosque by anybody at all.”

False claims had spread online that the suspect was an asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK by boat.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said rioters had “hijacked” a vigil for victims and will “feel the full force of the law”, while Home Secretary Yvette Cooper described the rioting as “violent attacks from thugs on the streets”, which she branded “appalling”.

The suspect, who was born in Cardiff to Rwandan parents, is from the village of Banks, just outside Southport, and a road in the area was cordoned off by detectives on Monday afternoon.

Police have said that although the motive for the attack is unclear, it is not believed to be terror-related.

A 32-year-old man from Standish was arrested on suspicion of possession of a flick knife in Eastbank Street, near where the vigil took place on Tuesday evening.

He was taken into custody and there were no reports that anyone was injured during the incident, Merseyside Police said.