Not enough of crime panel turned up
A key meeting which would have heard ‘controversial’ discussions on firearms licensing in the wake of the Plymouth shootings was abandoned on Friday because not enough people turned up for it.
The Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime Panel would have discussed proposed changes in firearms licensing as well as hearing a detailed report on how the community in Keyham has been recovering from the trauma of the shootings in August 2021.
Jake Davison went on a killing spree in which five people, including a three-year-old girl and Davison’s own mother, were killed in the Keyham area of Plymouth. Two more people were injured, and 22-year-old Davison later turned the gun on himself.
The apprentice crane operator was armed with a legally-held pump-action shotgun.
At an inquest last year senior coroner Ian Arrow said there had been a ‘serious failure’ on the part of Devon and Cornwall Police in granting and later failing to revoke Davison’s shotgun licence.
The Home Office asked all police forces in England and Wales to review their gun licensing practices immediately.
In a report to the meeting scheduled for Friday 7 July, Devon and Cornwall police and crime commissioner Alison Hernandez would have outlined proposals including tightening up licensing procedures and increasing fees.
But the meeting at Plymouth’s Council House was called off. The city council’s head of governance Ross Jago said the meeting was ‘inquorate’, meaning there were not enough people there to proceed.
He said there was little value in viewing the presentations in private, considering the ‘controversial’ nature of some of the items on the agenda.
The meeting would be reconvened later in the summer, he said.
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