SCHOOL VIOLENCE SOCIAL MEDIA

We have picked up social media posts that appear to be AI‑generated, encouraging school children to bring weapons to school and “tag” each other. The first date indicated is tomorrow, Friday 27th February, with others mentioned in the future. No doubt many of our young people have also seen this message. 

As it stands for Enfield, we have no specific intelligence that disturbances will happen tomorrow and none have happened at this point in Enfield.

The images appear to be AI‑generated and replicated for many different boroughs. This is likely to be (though not currently confirmed) an agitator or someone politically motivated, rather than students or young people arranging fights. Although I would tend to play down concerns about these images, we are planning and preparing just in case.

The Met has stood up Operation Cedarfield, which is a London‑wide response, and is using our intelligence teams under Project Alpha to monitor social media, along with our local intelligence teams who feed directly into our teams on the street.

Our neighbourhood teams and emergency response teams have been briefed about contact with and presence near schools, and we will have over 50 neighbourhood officers and PCSOs in Enfield tomorrow afternoon, in addition to our response teams.

If we receive specific intelligence about where, when, or how many students might be intending to cause a disturbance, we will move officers pre‑emptively. Our starting position will be to position our teams where we often see concentrations of students, Enfield Town or Edmonton Green Bus Station as examples of this, with other officers maintaining presence across the rest of the borough.

We are working with our partners in Enfield Council and have been in touch with schools to ensure everyone gets home safely. 

You will see an increased police presence around the schools tomorrow and if you have any concerns or hear anything specific where gatherings are taking place please contact 101, or if an emergency 999 to report it.