Knife Crime in The United Kingdom - Case Study

Running head: KNIFE CRIME IN THE UK: A STUDY
KNIFE CRIME IN THE UK: A STUDY
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1KNIFE CRIME IN THE UK: A STUDY
Introduction
In sociological terms, crime is often viewed as a deviant behavior in humans that strictly
violates the norms, cultural standards and social ethics that determine how humans are expected
to behave normally in a society. Crime is committed by individuals or groups who commit a
breach of rules and law for which the governing authorities or establishments can give penalties
or punishments. When a person commits crime, the result of the crime can lead to being
unenforced, rehabilitated or sometimes, executed in extreme cases. The particular paper talks in
details about “knife crime” that is prevalent in the United Kingdom, the reasons behind such
crimes, people who commit such crimes, target population, statistical data of the prevalence of
the crime and how such crimes are being tackled by the law and order department of the United
Kingdom. The paper is in the form of a descriptive and analytical essay.
Background
The United Kingdom is facing plethora of criminal activities and law and order issues in
the contemporary times and Britain, which is considered to be culturally developed state of the
UK has been facing the nuisance of knife crime across the country lately. The generic definition
of knife crime is that crime where someone is threatened with a knife by the perpetrator or
carrying a knife while robbing, molesting or carrying out burglary. Often, people who commit
knife crime physically harm the victim with the knife instead of showing the knife as a weapon
just to intimidate him/her. Certain knives have been deemed by the United Kingdom government
as offensive weapons and have been banned completely from the market. Availability of such
knives are difficult and might need a license. However, despite of such measures, knife crime
continues in the UK and is tremendously higher than what is expected. Since the year 2014, the

2KNIFE CRIME IN THE UK: A STUDY
UK society has seen a jump in knife crime. The areas of England and Whales have been marked
as the areas where knife crime has reached its peak. According to the report of ONS (Office for
National Statistics), the month of September in the year 2018 has witnessed a peak in the rise of
knife crime in the UK and especially, the areas of England and Whales. The number of crimes
and offenses that have been committed and accelerated with the usage of knives or sharp objects
went up to 8 per cent in the year 2019 than what was recorded in the year 2018 in the UK which
is not only alarming, but disturbing and a matter of concern at the same time. The metropolitan
city of London that happens to be Britain’s commercial and cultural capital is the core area of
knife crime in the UK. It would be shocking to realize that in the year 2018, the capital of
Britain, London saw a toll of 35 per cent of knife crime throughout the city. London is deemed to
be a city that welcomes all and has least xenophobia in her mind. London is also the commercial
capital of Great Britain and a plethora of immigrant workers from different countries seek refuge
in London to find employment opportunities and earn money. Therefore, such crimes are not
expected from such cities that are developed economically and socially from her peers. The
Metropolitan Police department of the city of London has been working relentlessly to curb the
growing menace of knife crime. The police department of London has seen an unprecedented
growth of knife crime in the city in the latest year. Dozens of families in London have been
ravished and injured by the knife crime offenders in London (Bbc.com. 2019).
Knife crime, in criminological terms, can be defined as an offense in order to commit
homicide, attempted murder, assault with an intention to create harm, injury, threat to kill along
with sexual offenses (rapes, gang rapes and molestation) and burglary. Knife is utilized to
commit such crimes as knife is a sharp object that is capable of injuring or killing humans easily.
Therefore, knife is used to intimidate, injure or kill the victim in order to complete the intention

3KNIFE CRIME IN THE UK: A STUDY
of the crime. The government of the United Kingdom has also kept a statute as knife possession
offense under which any general public of London does not have the discretion to carry an article
with or sharp point in public places such as schools, institutions and colleges, threatening with
blade or sharp object to anyone in any public place, possession of any offensive weapon,
utilizing anybody to look after such weapons and threatening anyone with such sharp weapons
for any intend (Edwards and Prins 2014).
Knife crime is generally committed in the UK that has relations with street violence and
robbery. According to the analysis carried out by the Metropolitan Police of London, most of the
knife crime offenders were male and half of them belonged to different ethnicities. It has also
been observed that 75 per cent of victims of knife crime are males who are shockingly aged
below 25 years. People from diversified ethnicities are also targeted for knife crime by the
perpetrators and offenders, as report says. The metropolitan cities of UK (including London)
have faced colossal cases of homicide or murder/ assassination. Almost half of the homicides
committed in the streets of England and London are result of fatal knife crimes. Some of the
knife crimes are also related to domestic abuse. Out of every three female victims of homicide,
one of them dies out of knife crime every year in London. A lot of people in the UK and its cities
are possessing and carrying knives or sharp objects with them. Such activities can be potentially
dangerous for the common public in the country. Majority of research conducted to understand
the reasons why such weapons were carried by some public in the cities ended up giving the
result of “self- defense” and “protection”. In spite of keeping weapons for safety purposes are
deemed to be right in today’s world where crime has become a part and parcel of life, it is not
statutorily correct at the same time. A thorough research utilizing psychological metrics has
depicted that carrying dangerous “knife like” weapons by the general public have different