The Guardian - Reading The Riots: Investigating Englands summer of disorder

Rioters from across England describe how it felt to be caught up in the chaos that engulfed the country last summer

Paul Lewis

Alex had stepped outside the pub in Tottenham for a cigarette when he saw the commotion. People were throwing bottles at police, and an abandoned police car had been set on fire.

He looked on as youths with covered faces pushed a second police car across the road. It struck a wall and rolled back into the street. Alex, who is 32, white, and from south London, watched the young men smash the windows and put a black bin-bag on the seat. Then he joined in.

I went up, put my head in there the front-seat window set light to the black bag and walked away from there and just slowly watched it, and everybody was cheering, Alex said. His real identity, like that of others interviewed for this study, has been disguised.

It was 6 August two days after police shot Mark Duggan dead and a small demonstration over his death was sliding into a riot. For three hours, Duggans family and friends waited outside the police station for a senior police officer who never arrived. They left the protest when the crowds swelled, and began attacking the police cars.

Saturday 6 August, 8.30pm

Alex watched the car he set fire to smoulder. He waited for the windows to crack and the petrol tank to explode. He had known nothing about the protest when he first left the pub. When people in the crowd explained why they were there, he quickly decided to join in.

It was the police car I know what they stand for, he said. For the record: yeah, I do hate the fucking police ... I was caught up in the situation. And it was like: lets cause fucking chaos lets cause a riot.

Instead, what followed was a lull. No one was looting or nothing like that. We went back to the pub, came back out again and then shitloads more police arrived, and the horses, and they just shut off the whole road.

The image of the two burning police cars were circulating on thousands of mobile phones within minutes. People from neighbouring boroughs were pouring into Tottenham to see what was going on.

The fires that began in Tottenham would burn through English towns and cities for four nights. The summer disturbances left five people dead, hundreds injured and more than 4,000 arrested. It was the most serious bout of civil unrest in a generation, with as many as 15,000 people taking to the streets.

In an investigation into how and why the disorder spread, we have interviewed 270 people who rioted in six major cities. Each had a different story to tell. But like Alex, their accounts challenge the many assumptions about the riots.

Sunday 7 August, 12.15am

I could see the smoke from Edmonton, said Angela, 18, a student. And I was like: Oh my God, I want to see whats happening. She arrived with friends to see more fires blazing along Tottenham High Road.

Following messages on their BlackBerry smartphones, Angela and her friends headed to take pictures of the fire engulfing a Carpetright store. Then they jumped into the car of a friend who said they were going to Wood Green.

Less than 100 yards away, James, a 19-year-old student from Hackney, was also thinking about leaving the area. He had headed to Tottenham with the intention of fighting police.

I didnt plan to rob anything, he said. Someone came up with the idea: if we spread this, could the police like control it? So like, lets go to Wood Green. I called as many people as I could: Oh, I hear everyones going to go to Wood Green call as many people as you can. Go to Wood Green.

He arrived to see people breaking into jewellery shops and a man running out of Holland & Barrett with protein shakes. We had one motive, that was to get as many things as we can and sell on, he said. The phone shop close to JD [Sports] got ripped apart, he said.

James stole several phones. I think the looting came about because it was linked to police, he said. Were showing them that, yeah, were bigger than the police, we are actually bigger than the police. Fair enough, we are breaking the law and everything, but theres more of us than there are of you. So if we want to do this, we can do this. And you wont do anything to stop us.

Angela the teenager taking pictures of the burning Carpetright store was being driven to Wood Green along backstreets when she saw the commotion. We saw lots of people in cars. They were like: Get what you can. They parked the car and walked along the high street to find the Shopping City mall being emptied.

And then we saw H&M got smashed in too, and we went to H&M. Some of my friends took some of the clothes, she said. It was a surreal sight: People were just running about really, like headless chickens. And I was just laughing about it. Like when my friends were walking with clothes in their hands, I was just like: Oh my God. You lot are mad, absolutely mad.

Angela and her friends put the looted clothes and some creams stolen from The Body Shop in a wheelie bin and pushed it home. They passed a supermarket that had been gutted by fire. What are you going to set places on fire for? she said. This is a place where you go to shop sometimes and you want to set it on fire? She said her sister lived nearby. I know Asdas there but Aldis cheaper. So, shes got nowhere else to get cheap stuff but shes got kids.

She said she saw 10 police vans drive past her friends as they pushed their wheelie bin. I was just thinking to myself: you see a group of girls, with a big wheelie bin going across the road and youre not going to stop them? Theyre not doing their job.

Sunday, 9pm

The next night, Angela joined the thousands of people who headed to Enfield. All day a message had been circulating on BlackBerry phones announcing the riots would continue in the suburb, six miles north of Tottenham.

Everyone in edmonton enfield woodgreen everywhere in north link up at enfield town station 4 o clock sharp!!!! it said. The message urged people to bring balaclavas, hammers, trollies, cars and vans but advised against starting fires. It added: Police cant stop it.

At the same time as crowds were gathering in Enfield, violence was breaking out 16 miles south, in Brixton. Denise, a 17-year-old from Norbury who had spent the day at the Brixton Splash music festival, was sitting on a grass mound talking to friends. Suddenly, she saw people putting on masks and taking out weapons. All the police come running down, she said. I just see bottles flying. Ive never seen police so scared before it was like they had no control whatsoever. Like even the police cars, the police vans, they was just throwing rocks at them.

When police were overpowered, Denise joined the crowd that began running down the high street, covered her face and walked into a corner shop.

People was just passing fags from the counters, she said. You know what? For once it felt like you had so much power. Denise didnt want to go into H&M because it was too dark. She was waiting outside for her friends when a man ran past with trainers. I was like: Where did you get that from? He was like: Foot Locker. And everyone started running to Foot Locker.

The shoe shop was being ripped apart. I seen an old guy running out of Foot Locker literally this guy was like 70. He took a hat and was running for his life. The images of Foot Locker were being broadcast in real-time on BlackBerry phones. One message showed a photo of a teenager grinning beneath eight boxes of trainers. Another showed the store in flames.

Tony, 25, was at a friends birthday party in Brixton when he started receiving the messages. At first I thought: Wow, this is terrible. But then I started to think about everybody else getting free stuff, he said. I did stop myself for for quite a few hours. More and more messages were coming in. I saw people running down the street with stuff. And before I knew it I just left the house.