Starmer says he understands anger after Golders Green knifeman avoided prison sentence

Keir Starmer has told Jewish News he understands the anger within the community after a man who terrorised staff at a Golders Green kosher supermarket whilst brandishing a large knife escaped a prison sentence.

Speaking at an emotional meeting with the families of knife crime victims, the Labour leader said the failure to hand Gabriel Abdullah, 34, a prison term for the attack on staff at the story was “one example” of where somebody in possession of a large blade had not been made to “carry the consequence” of his criminal offence.

Barnet resident Abdullah pleaded guilty to the crime, but earlier this month was handed two concurrent suspended sentences, along with a nine month alcohol treatment requirement after he was initially charged with affray and possession of a knife.

Asked if he agreed the failure to send Abdullah to prison added to the perception that the law as it currently stood was too soft on those who carry out knife crime, Starmer told Jewish News:”I do recognise it, and that is but one example.

“Other examples are where people have been carrying knives and the penalty has been writing a letter.

“That’s why I say we’ve got to stop the sale of knives in the first place.

“You do have to have a Young Futures programme to pull people out of beginning to get into difficulty.  But the third bit is really important. If you carry a knife you have to carry the consequences.”

At his trial Matthew Ness, Abdullah’s barrister, had told the court that he had been suffering from paranoid schizophrenia before the incident – which he reportedly tried to self-medicate with alcohol.

But the suspended sentence angered those who had fought off Abdullah in inside Kay’s kosher supermarket on Hamilton Road, after he screamed antisemitic abuse at them.

At the time of his arrest police praised the bravery of the shop staff, and members of the public who intervened, and thanked Shomrim for their invention after they were alerted to the attack.

Starmer told journalists:“It’s a problem that we all have responsibilities for so legislation on knives is a Government issue and the Government has failed on this issue. We will not fail on this issue.

“There are other measures, one of the families here their son was murdered by a knife that was sent through the post by a shop, ordered online in ordinary packaging and picked up by a 15-year-old who didn’t need to show any identification.”

On Tuesday at the Lyric theatre in Hammersmith, west London, Starmer  vowed to make tackling knife crime a “moral mission” at an emotional meeting with victims’ families and the actor Idris Elba.

The Labour leader met the families of victims including Ronan Kanda, who was stabbed to death aged 16 in 2022 in Wolverhampton, and Dwayne Simpson, who was 20 when he was stabbed to death on the street in Brixton in 2014.

Starmer said that if he becomes Prime Minister the campaigners must “hold him to account” for his progress.

He said his party would move to ease planning restrictions on building more prisons, to ensure criminals who committed knife crime were either put in prison, and not let out early before finishing sentencing.

“The government has announced 16 times that they’re going to ban the online sale of zombie knives,” said Starmer, before promising his government would legislate on this.

“I think that there are some things we can do very quickly,” he said.  “This question of banning the online sale of knives should have been done years ago.”

Starmer said he had no time for those who sought to play political games with the moral issue of knife crime, especially by blaming Sadiq Khan.

“I cannot tell you how fed up familes who have lost loved ones are of politicians squabbling about whose fault it is,” he added.”I want politicians to recognise just how important this is and to do something about it.

“For this government to simply say it’s somebody else’s fault is insulting.”The sale of online knives, that’s not a matter for the Mayor of London, that’s something for our parliament. Making sure the sentences are corresponding to the offences, that’s something for our government.”