39 Police Officers Injured In Unrest After 3 Girls Killed In UK

Police attacked as disorder breaks out in Southport 

"Thugs" were to blame for the violence that saw 39 police officers injured in Southport, the town's MP has said.

Unrest broke out in the Merseyside town hours after a vigil to remember the victims of Monday's knife attack at a dance school in which three young girls were killed.

Officers were pelted with bricks, a police van was set on fire, and eight officers were seriously hurt, Merseyside Police said.

MP Patrick Hurley described the violence - close to a mosque - as "horrific".

Workmen start the clean-up in the town after a night of violence 

Mr Hurley told BBC’s Radio 4 Today programme that the "riot" was "led by people from outside the town".

Police said the violence was believed to have involved English Defence League supporters.

Mr Hurley condemned "thugs who had got the train in" who were using the "deaths of three little kiddies for their own political purposes".

On Tuesday, Merseyside Police named the three girls who were killed at a Taylor Swift-themed dance workshop at the Hart Space studio in Hart Street.

They were six-year-old Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice Dasilva Aguiar, nine.
  



BBC