Scotland Yard fears Muslim extremists are recruiting members

[Keyse_0208]

Scotland Yard fears Muslim extremists are recruiting members inside prisons

Some of London's most notorious teenage criminal gangs are being targeted for recruitment by Islamist extremists, according to Special Branch officials.

Poverty Driven Children, from Brixton, the Muslim Boys, from Camberwell, and the Money Crew, from Hackney, were three gangs identified at a Scotland Yard meeting last month. All were thought to have members who claimed to be radical converts. The fusion of two such corrosive cultures has increased fears that someone could follow the path of Richard Reid, the "shoe bomber" and former gang member who tried to blow up a plane.

A senior officer said the conversion of gang members begins in London prisons such as Brixton and Feltham Young Offenders' Institution, where some Islamist radicals have been jailed. "Conditions 'inside' provide a captive audience. Once outside, the gang members return to their old stomping grounds and their old habits, but take the trappings of their new religion with them.

"They might describe themselves as Muslims, but they are anything but. They claim to despise western excesses, but still deal in drugs and indulge in violence," he said. "The concern is that the youngsters around these gangs are impressionable and violent and would therefore be the perfect recruits for terrorists," he added.

Poverty Driven Children, or PDC, which began as a teenage gang on the Angell estate in Brixton in the 1980s, grew to control much of the crack dealing in south London. Some senior gang members - including Jaja Soze, a record producer who is a Muslim convert - have renounced violence and criminal activity. However, there is still a core of more than 100 involved in drug dealing and violent crime.

The Muslim Boys, reported in 2005 to have several hundred members aged nine to 25, have since been reduced to a few dozen because so many have been arrested and imprisoned. The gang was said to have been responsible for more than a dozen murders. Two years ago, jailed gang members were accused in an internal memo at the high-security Belmarsh prison of forcing fellow prisoners to convert to Islam.

The Money Crew, also known as Innit 4 Da Money and Love of Money, is an increasingly influential gang in north-east London that has been blamed for a spate of street robberies. In 2008, one member was convicted of murder and two others of conspiracy to rob in connection with a drug-related murder and robbery in Watford.

Reid, 35, joined the FRF Crew in Brixton as a youth and converted to Islam after being sent to Feltham for a series of petty crimes. He was jailed for life in 2003 in the United States for attempting to set light to explosives hidden in his shoe on an American Airlines flight.

One south London murder detective, who specialises in gang warfare, said he was aware of extremists attaching themselves to established black gangs. "There have been some concerns with gangs in south London such as the Muslim Boys," he said. He added that extremism typically manifested itself in "posturing" rather than the dedicated lifestyles of radicals. "Gang life tends to be too disorganised for extremists."

An academic who has studied Britain's teenage gangs said police concerns may be overblown. Professor John Pitts, author of The Reluctant Gangsters, which deconstructs British gang culture, said some gang members are posing as Islamists to gain street credibility and trade on false perceptions about links to terrorists. "There is no great organisation for extremist organisations to cling to. These gangs are loose affiliations, revolving around casual violence, drugs, rap music and the abuse of women. While there is no doubt that radical Islam has attracted some of those on the fringes of gangs, I would be surprised if there was any kind of wholesale conversion," he said.

Why do so many black youths convert to islam inside jail.?

[military-mind]

being just black is not cool anymore..laakin being muslim iyo black..now thats gangster akhi

[rashid22]

being just black is not cool anymore..laakin being muslim iyo black..now thats gangster akhi

really?? is that why u feel so depressed?

[Keyse_0208]

mm, i know what u mean, its like a new trend for them, mostly something to rap about, listen to this bre from 1:50

[*Nobleman*]

Interesting article. Laakin to be fair a lot of black brothers do convert to Islam and practice better than those born into the deen. No violence, no criminal tendecies, no drug dealing, just high off the deen. Check out Brixton mosque mashallah.

Laakin these 'muslim criminal gangs' are anything but muslim. Hating the west, but glorifying drugs and violence, doesnt make sense.

[shaamboo]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours. I fear allah and not another human

[*Nobleman*]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours. I fear allah and not another human

Thats is scotland yard as in the police, not scotland the country.

[Keyse_0208]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours

Dumb fuking faarax

[shaamboo]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours

Dumb fuking faarax

says the kid who believes his first step is to acknowledge his ignorance. well done wellfare child
Priceless !!

[rich-boy]

mm, i know what u mean, its like a new trend for them, mostly something to rap about, listen to this bre from 1:50

i saw this guy on tv last week he use to be a crack dealer in hackney converted to islam when he was locked up he just need more knowledge about the deen

[shaamboo]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours. I fear allah and not another human

Thats is scotland yard as in the police, not scotland the country.

look at this badow trying to tell me what scotland yard is ?? since when are you a mind reader wtf .

[*Nobleman*]

Well that is scotlands problem not ours. I fear allah and not another human

Thats is scotland yard as in the police, not scotland the country.

look at this badow trying to tell me what scotland yard is ?? since when are you a mind reader wtf .

Quit acting like you knew what Scotland yard was before googling it. You obviously thought it was Scotland the country you muppet.

[shaamboo]

Right, Is that you come up with ?? Google what a fcking badow with an internet.

[*Nobleman*]

Right, Is that you come up with ?? Google what a fcking badow with an internet.

I think you will find that your the badow, getting emotional cos you got exposed for being a badow and throwing that word around wont make you any less of a badow, Mr badow.

[shaamboo]

Looool @ exposed, Dude you been sitting too long in a mafrish. Callin me a badow makes me wonder if you even know the meaning of the word badow??


sht head.