Nearly 500 knives have been seized from people attending London’s main family court in only four months, one of the country’s top judges revealed today.
Sir Andrew McFarlane, president of the Family Division, said that 473 knives over three inches long had been confiscated during security checks at the Central Family Court in Holborn between January and April this year.
Another 230 knives had been found “deposited in the precincts” of the court during the same period in an apparent attempt by carriers to avoid having them seized when they entered the building.
Sir Andrew said that judges and court officials did not believe the knives had been intended for use inside the court.
But he said that the scale of the finds showed “it simply seems to be a facet of everyday life in 2019 for some members of the population to carry a weapon with them at all times”.
His remarks came during a speech at Gray’s Inn in which Sir Andrew also said courts were increasingly using care proceedings to protect children at risk from “gang culture” and the “county lines” drug trade.
He said that children who once might have been prosecuted were now being “seen as victims” in need of protection.
Local authorities and the courts were seeking and approving care orders on the grounds that such children were “beyond parental control” and “suffering or likely to suffer significant harm” as a result.
Sir Andrew said the trend of knife carrying by young people and other family members attending the court in Holborn was “one of the regular challenges now presented to the staff and security teams”.
