Displaying items by tag: Huddersfield

Journalist Mobeen Azhar went to Huddersfield to investigate gun crime. His enquiry, lasting almost two years, found links between Huddersfield and national and international drugs trading, mainly by British Pakistanis. Each incident he saw on videotape seemed to follow the same pattern - streets cordoned off, gunshots, blood, and masked men speeding off. Witnesses were afraid to talk for fear of retribution. The words ‘young Pakistani’ kept coming up, with suggestions of a drug turf war. ‘It’s getting out of control - you can’t pop down to the shop without a bulletproof vest’, one woman said. In 20 months, 95+ incidents involving firearms related to the drugs trade occurred in one Huddersfield district alone. People justified selling drugs because ‘the customers aren’t Muslim, so you don’t have to respect them’. One in every 100 people in Yorkshire and Humber has used crack cocaine and other opiates.