Like many residents of the Liverpool suburb of Dovecot, Lorie and Adam Wright, who live only a street away from the house where nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel was fatally shot on Monday night, are still in shock.
“If it had happened further up the street, it could have been me opening the door,” said Lorie. “I’m nosy, I definitely would have looked out if I’d heard something.”
They did not see or hear anything that night but, again like many who live here, the Wrights say they would absolutely report violent crime to the police, especially when a child has been the victim. “Anything to do with kids, there’s no such thing as grassing,” she added.
In fact, many people in this part of Liverpool feel they have been unfairly labelled criminal conspirators over the last few days, thanks to reports of a “no grass culture” in which residents protect the identities of gangsters.
There simply is no code of silence, they say, and the community appears united in helping to find Olivia’s killer.
Police on the ground said people had been friendly and supportive after the shooting, which also left her mother, Cheryl Korbel, and a 35-year-old man named as Joseph Nee – who was the suspected target of a gangland murder attempt – with gunshot wounds.
One officer, who has worked in the area for a year, said: “Everyone’s on common ground. Lots of people have stopped and spoken to us, saying things like: ‘I really hope you catch them.’ It’s a nice area with good people, it’s just a minority that aren’t.”
Another neighbour was chatting to a friend outside the police tape at the end of Kingsheath Avenue, where Olivia lived with her mother and two older siblings. She was adamant that people in the community would report gang crime.
“If I knew anything, I’d stand up to them,” she said.
“Be careful,” said her friend.
“I don’t care,” she responded.
The friend, who lives nearby and works at the local Tesco, said the Dovecot area had been a gang area in the past but things had been quiet for a few years and residents had been glad to see the back of this kind of crime.
“You haven’t heard of it for years,” she said.
Olivia’s death, the third gun-related fatality in a week in Liverpool, came after a year of no firearms deaths in Merseyside. But in recent weeks there had been a few incidents, such as stabbings and firearms discharges, that had residents concerned and they were worried that young people were becoming increasingly caught up.
“They’re getting younger – 13, 14, 15,” the neighbour added. “They’re not sacred of nothing. They’re not bothered about going to jail. If they’ve decided they’re going after someone, they won’t stop until they get them. It’s about revenge.”
But despite confidence among some local residents, there are still people who are afraid to speak out about what they know or have seen.
It is a legitimate fear with a killer still at large, said Peter Mitchell, a local councillor who is the chief executive of the charity Big Help Project, which runs food banks and drop-in centres throughout Liverpool.
“Right now, people are dealing with the aftershocks of a child being shot behind the front door,” said Mitchell, speaking between talking to residents at the Drive community centre at the end of Kingsheath Avenue. “If it was your front door or you lived next door would you be scared? I would be. So I don’t think that’s in any way, on any level, a reflection of the community. I think that’s a very natural feeling. There’s a very strong sense of ‘let’s catch these people. Let’s get them.’”
He added: “I’ve heard people ask about gangs. Nonsense. Not here, it doesn’t exist. And don’t give them credibility by calling them gangs. What you have, in the same way as you have in many, many of our inner city communities, are criminals. Some of them are ultra-organised criminals, who are earning money through criminal activities.
“There is no code of silence. The community have never had this before. There’s no reason to think that the community will face this again.”
