Last night, a peaceful protest in Tottenham in North London against the shooting of Mark Duggan (29) by police turned violent. The questionable circumstances of the shooting have led to (more) anger in the community against the police.
When I first moved to London in August 2009, I actually lived just 300 meters away from Tottenham Police Station. I lived there for about 9 months and I loved the area: it is culturally diverse, lively, colourful, plenty of green space and just a short walk to a canal along which you can jog or ride a bicycle and you’ll be out of London in a few minutes.
This shows that I am good at finding hot spots, but then I displayed terrible timing by moving away too soon. Today I returned to my old neighbourhood to take some photos for you:
This part of London was definitely far more interesting to live at than the areas where I subsequently moved to, first Morden and then Bermondsey.
UPDATE: As the Tottenham Riots become the London Riots, I have recorded my preliminary thoughts here.
(C) for all photos: Andreas Moser.
The Happy Hermit 
Any idea why the crowd turned angry? I haven’t been able to look up the news on the Beeb – my Internet service hasn’t been working right since a bad storm passed through last night. And BBC America won’t run news until tomorrow morning, though I might be able to find a Deutsche-Welle wrap-up on an American channel called Link TV.
And I think you’re beginning to show a bit of that stereotypical English trait of understatement. I would absolutely call a burning double-decker bus a “hot spot”!
The police killed an innocent man 3 days ago and long term social pressures came to a head, follow on twitter on my blog on here http://api.twitter.com/#!/TheFreshBureau
Thanks for the info and link. I knew about the shooting, I was just curious why the protesting crowd went from fairly amiable to full-blown riot so quickly. The Beeb was rather quiet about it this morning, they were chasing the financial mess on both sides of the Pond.
Once again, thanks!
There are many rumours that Mark Duggan was sitting in a car or already on the ground and overpowered when he was fatally shot by police. Of course I don’t know what is true, but people don’t seem to find this improbable.
And the relationship between the local community and the police might have been strained already. I heard a few locals today complain about the police only protecting their station last night and none of the residential buildings in the neighbourhood. But then, they might simply have been overwhelmed by the crowd.
Fantastic pictures, for some definitions of the word fantastic.
Here’s what your second from last used to look like:http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/KlkGMJ5u5Our_gL5PwcoPA
Even as a ruin, it still looked like a beautiful and somehow “grand” building.
That is a crazy before & after picture. Thanks to you both for posting.
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It begs the question if anger over a shooting justifies – or is even the reason for – destroying the livelihoods of small shop owners, who may just be eking out a living, ransacking public space and property that all residences inhabit and use, and traumatizing the same people. Injustice to third parties doesn’t bring justice to a man shot unjustly (if you assume it’s the case).
Some very good pictures that sum up the mess we are in, yes, we are “all in it together”.
@Johncerickson, not sure about the supposed causes of the riots, some more questions here though: http://frederichkelpi.wordpress.com/
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