A London suburb dubbed ‘murder mile’ has had gang warfare ‘spiral out of control’ after a dad-to-be became the fourth person killed in the area.
Curtis Green, 30, was killed in Wells Park Road, Sydenham, in broad daylight on Sunday morning.
Police are still urgently searching for the gunman, who also shot a woman in the legs and sprayed another man with bullets.
But residents say this is no longer out-of-the-ordinary after five other murder and attempted murders have been carried out in the area.
James Hunter, 18, died after he was stabbed through the heart on Wells Park Road in June 2014.
His killer Giovanni Dixon, then 17, ‘jovially’ described what he had done to his fellow gang members after they got away on a bus.
They attacked James over a perceived slight to one of the gang’s friends.
In 2021, 17-year-old Levi Ernest-Morrison was killed with a machete, with one of his killers being driven to the planned attack by their mum.
Alex Scruples, then 17, attacked Levi who had autism and could not run very fast so ferociously officers described the scene as ‘harrowing’.
Now locals are saying the gang rivalries are affecting everyone as they now longer feel safe.
Liya Makonnen told MailOnline: ‘Things have got very bad around here over the last few years. A lot of young people are in gangs and they’re out of control.
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‘This is not the first time that we’ve had a murder like this in Sydenham or nearby.
‘It used to be a really safe, middle-class area but there are a lot of gangs all over south London and that has now affected life for all of us.’
Sydenham is often the site of confrontation between gangs from Croydon, Brixton and Lewisham.
One resident said a gang operates on the Sydenham Hill estate, while another called T1D is based in Dulwich just one mile away.
Others include the Lewisham Ghetto Boys and the Uptown gang which operates on the Dulwich/Sydenham border.
One resident said: ‘Some people call it murder mile.’
In 2019 a man was killed in a botched assassination after Reece Ramsey-Johnson, 25, tried to murder Marley Lucas who he thought to be his friend’s killer, but accidentally shot himself in the chest.
Footage shows a witness standing over Reece shouting: ‘He’s shot himself – he’s f***cking shot himself.’
A gang of four had cornered Marley inside his car, with one witness saying: ‘It looked like he was using the butt of the gun on the car window and it backfired.
‘When I got there they were saying he shot himself.’
In August 2022 an 18-year-old was stabbed in Westwood Hill, Sydenham, with police saying the victim ‘may never fully recover’.
It is not known if the attacker was ever caught.
In July this year a teenage boy was stabbed on Wells Park road as children were walking home from school.
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