The jailing of Joel Harvey is a hugely positive result for Merseyside Police.
The reckless, casually violent young man had already pumped bullets into one man and was strongly suspected of shooting a second in the chest when he was collared by armed officers in June last year, aged just 16.
Harvey's sentence on Thursday came only two days after another sentencing for yet another teenager gun thug, Chesney Miller, who had shot a boy in the abdomen in Prescot and was later involved in a vicious stabbing outside Riverside College in Widnes.
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This month 18-year-old Rio Jones was also locked up for accidentally shooting a 15-year-old schoolgirl in the neck in March last year, while attempting to kill a gang rival, Shakur Watson. The girl was critically injured but survived her injuries, in what proved to be a chilling pre-cursor to the wave of deadly gun violence in the summer and winter.
Merseyside Police also racked up a major victory in April last year when teenage "gang boss" Harry O'Brien, just 16, was locked up for running a drugs graft in Dingle and ordering a spate of shootings and arson attacks.
These four young thugs, all linked to spraying residential areas with bullets, shows how the success of investigations into non-fatal firearms offences is absolutely crucial to preventing further tragedies.
Like no other case, the final crimes of Harvey showed how taking these young but terrifyingly violent criminals off the streets could prevent the next tragedy on the streets of Merseyside.
Harvey was clad in a balaclava and carrying a gun primed and ready to fire when he was collared in a raid by armed officers in June last year. No-one has told police who Harvey was planning to pay a visit to or why.
However, as Judge Clement Goldstone, KC, observed, the fact his previous crimes did not leave any dead bodies in the streets was no guarantee tragedy would be avoided again. He said at Liverpool Crown Court: "I have no doubt from the fact that the pistol was loaded and ready to fire that, had the police not arrested you, you would have used the pistol to settle another score with potentially fatal consequences."
Despite these successes, there are a number of high-profile although non-fatal shootings that remain stubbornly unsolved from recent months. The probe into a terrifying shooting in Croxdale Road West, West Derby, in July, where a gunman was recorded by a witness standing over a 23-year-old man pumping bullets into his legs appeared to be progressing well when two men were arrested.
However those men were released without further action and no further arrests have been made. It was a similar story in Anfield, where a gunman burst through a door in Norgate Street in August and shot a man in the legs.
There have still been no arrests after two men were shot in the legs in Litherland on Bonfire night last year, and a cluster of tit-for-tat shootings in Wavertree early last year, which saw a woman shot in the legs by a man who burst into her house, are also still unsolved.
The murder of Elle Edwards on Christmas Eve also followed a number of serious non-fatal shootings, believed to be linked to gang violence on the Woodchurch and Beechwood estates.
Speaking after one shooting in the Woodchurch estate in December, in which a man was shot in the legs, Merseyside Police head of investigations, Detective Chief Superintendent Mark Kameen, expressed his frustration at victims not co-operating.
He said at the time: “We know that gun crime has a huge impact on our communities and that people understandably feel afraid when incidents such as this happen but I want to reassure those communities that Merseyside Police remains committed to investigating all incidents and removing guns, and those who chose to recklessly use them, off our streets.
“Unfortunately our investigations are often frustrated and obstructed when people, including those who are victims, refuse to tell us what they know. In this most recent incident at the weekend the Wirral victim is not co-operating with our enquiries, but this won’t stop us doing everything we can to find the person or persons responsible.
“Let me be clear - guns have no places on our streets. I would urge anyone with information, either about the incidents at the weekend, or any other incident to come forward and tell us what they know and help us to put these criminals behind bars where they belong."
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