Page 55 - the SyI Quarterly 11

Chartered Security Professionals

• 20th July 2018
Thomas Wyllie and Alex Bolland, two 14-year-old boys from North Yorkshire, had planned a agencies doing about it? There is no national
training and very little guidance on the matter. In
Columbine-style massacre at their Yorkshire school and drawn up a hit-list of targets including fellow
pupils and teachers to murder in Northallerton. Justice Cheema-Grubb said their plan “was not my experience teachers are expected to compile a
wishful-thinking or fantasy, it was a real plot”. and added “It was a firm plan with specific targets in lockdown procedure with little or no training and
mind as well as a plan to make indiscriminate explosives”. They were sentenced to a combined total of no insight into the subject. Usually, a lockdown will
22 years. compile of a few pieces of A4 that can deal with a
dangerous dog, smoke plume or an incident outside
the school, but it certainly falls short of dealing with a
• 13th September 2019
Kyle Davies, 19, of the Wotton area of Gloucester. Convicted of attempting to possess a firearm and spree killer(s)
ammunition to endanger life and sentenced to 16 years. He was obsessed with the Columbine High
School shooting and planned a similar massacre in the UK. He was only caught after ordering a Glock Even the ‘Run Hide Tell’ from NaCTSO won’t work
for primary or junior schools. Children are the one
handgun and ammunition from the dark web to carry out the mass execution he spent months
researching. He was diagnosed with autism and depression. section of the community who won’t run from danger
as they will run to the responsible adult for protection
In my home county of Cheshire, we have also had some incidents of note. and guidance. As in Dunblane, the first people killed
were the responsible adults. There is no training
for what to do once in Lockdown, no guidance on
• February 2018
Philip Day 55 years old. University of Chester Academy Northwich (UCAN) in Cheshire. He started preparing to fight if the stronghold is breached, and
a personal crusade where he stalked numerous teachers and carried out an arson attack on the no thought to the stand down and aftermath.
school after making an unsubstantiated allegations of child abuse. He stated it was a “playground Very soon the Protect Duty legislation will be
for paedophiles”. He was convicted of two counts of arson and two counts of stalking. “He had no coming in and schools are specifically mentioned
as organisations that will need to mitigate against a
remorse” and was sentenced to 15 years.
terror attack.
• 29 Nov 2019
Queens Park School, Chester - A schoolboy aged 15 was sentenced to 4 years after a “frenzied knife Is there any guidance forthcoming for the schools to
attack” on a boy he had become fixated on. He repeatedly plunged a blade into his back, head and rely on? Is there any training for the Heads, school
planners, Council H&S Inspectors? My guess is no.
neck following a heated argument after lessons. He bought the knife that day from a local shop.
This is likely due to complacency. This is the exact
reason (and wisdom) of bringing in the Protect Duty
• 17th December 2019
A 15-year-old boy brought a large kitchen knife to a Chester secondary school. He told the legislation. To force organisations to take action
headteacher ‘Touch me and I’ll drop you’. The defence stated he had suicidal thoughts and was a very because they have to do it.
troubled young man” in need of help. He had no previous convictions or warnings.
The problem they face is, who do they turn to, who
is a competent person, how much money will it cost
Alongside these incidents, is the global trend of spree killer school attacks and the terrorist threat
there is also extreme ideologies. The most worrying for schools is the ‘Incels’ (Involuntary celibates). and how much time will it take? Wouldn’t it be great to
They are radical mainly online forums populated by disaffected young men and centred on violent have a national course, endorsed by the government
and unions that is inexpensive, easily taught, easily
misogyny. Some Incels believe that women’s political empowerment and ability to select their sexual
partners has severely degraded men’s social status thus preventing them from having romantic remembered, practical, effective and fits in with
relationships with the opposite sex. Many share similarities with extreme right-wing groups by current practices. Now that’s a product worth looking
attributing society’s ills to social liberalism, women and ethnic minorities, racial hatred and far right at…
extremis. Multiple spree killer attacks have been carried out in schools and colleges in the US and Rob Stenhouse CSyP spent a long career in the Royal
Canada by Incels, including Elliot Rodger who murdered 6 people including 2 women in Santa Barbara
USA (and seriously injured 14 others), before shooting himself, Rodger had become an internet Marines and MoD Police before moving into his role
sensation and subsequently become the hero of the Incel movement who describe him as ‘The in North Wales Police. He spent his final years in
Supreme Gentleman’. the police at the National CBRN Centre, National CT
Network with West Midlands Police as the Capabilities
Manager, Tactical Advisor and Instructor and now
In the world of risk, there is a saying, ‘predictable is preventable’. So, if we learn the lessons from
history and acknowledge the evidence above and combine this with the international trend of spree is a Security Advisor at Cheshire West and Chester
killer attacks on schools, we should at least acknowledge the probability it will happen somewhere Council. He was admitted to the Register on the 14th
in the UK at some point in the future. That being the case, what are the schools and government March 2022.

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