A 15-year-old boy in Sunderland became the first person in England to be charged with the offence of rioting under s1 of the Public Order Act 1968 by the Criminal Prosecution Service (CPS) on Thursday after violent anti-immigrant protests broke out across the UK.
The charge of riot holds a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, which is more than any of its counterpart offences. Violent disorder, for example, carries a maximum penalty of five years imprisonment.
The requirements for a riot charge are that the defendant acted violently with 12 or more people for a common purpose and that this reasonably scared others. The 15-year-old defendant had previously pleaded guilty to violent disorder and burglary on Sunday.
People took to the streets of Sunderland on the second of August in a continuation of the violent riots across the country. The disorder saw the targeting of mosques, Muslims, and ethnic minorities. Video evidence posted on Sky News shows buildings on fire, cars flipped over and burning, police station windows smashed, and police guarding local mosques.
The CPS announced earlier today, on the 16th of August, that the first adult to be charged with riot is Kieren Usher, who also took part in the Sunderland riots on the second of August.
Likely as a result of calls from politicians across the respond to the riots, including the Prime Minister Kier Starmer and ex-First Minister of Scotland Hamza Yousaf among others, the police and the CPS have been cracking down on rioters. Notably, UK law associations expressed concern over the new 24-hour night courts introduced to deal with rioters.
The Sunderland riots have been condemned by Kim McGuinness, the mayor of the North East.
McGuinness said that it is:
vital we bring calm and safety back to our streets, and I have clearly set out what our region needs to avoid a repeat of the dreadful scenes we witnessed in Sunderland this weekend. We need these events to stop: they are not protest, they are a disguise for violence and vandalism and will not be tolerated.
The riots began as a response to a tragedy in the Sefton, Southport, in which a man wearing a COVID mask entered a Taylor Swift-themed dance recital for children and stabbed them, leaving three dead. The defendant was falsely accused of being Muslim, which catalysed the disorder that has since taken place in cities across the UK. Leader of the Sefton Council, the town in Southport where the attacks against the young girls took place, Marion Atkinson has promised to “stand strong and united alongside [muslim people] against all forms of violence in our society.”
