Plymouth gunman Jake Davison kept shotgun after admitting assault

The incel murderer Jake Davison
Support us and go ad-free

Police did not seize Plymouth gunman Jake Davison’s shotgun and licence after he admitted assaulting two youths in a park, it has emerged.

Shotgun

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said the 22-year-old’s shotgun and licence were only seized in December last year when concerns were raised directly with Devon and Cornwall Police. Davison had been taking part in a voluntary intervention programme – an alternative to being charged or cautioned – after admitting assaulting two youths in a park in Plymouth last September.

The IOPC said Devon and Cornwall Police had offered the apprentice crane operator a place on its Pathfinder scheme.

Floral tributes
Jake Davison killed his mother and four other people in a matter of minutes before turning the gun on himself (Ben Birchall/PA

At the end of November last year, a scheme worker raised concerns with the force’s firearms licensing department about Davison’s possession of a shotgun. The shotgun and certificate were seized by police on 7 December.

Following his completion of the Pathfinder scheme in March 2021 and a subsequent review by the firearms licensing department, the shotgun and certificate were returned to Davison on 9 July.

Read on...

Support us and go ad-free

A little over a month later – following a row with his mother – Davison shot her dead inside her home in Biddick Drive, Keyham, before killing four others in a 12-minute rampage.

Three-year-old Sophie Martyn and her father Lee, 43, were shot dead in an attack witnessed by horrified onlookers as they walked their pet dog in Biddick Drive.

Davison then shot Stephen Washington, 59, in a nearby park, before shooting Kate Shepherd, 66, on Henderson Place.

He then turned the gun on himself before armed officers reached him.

Support us and go ad-free

We know everyone is suffering under the Tories - but the Canary is a vital weapon in our fight back, and we need your support

The Canary Workers’ Co-op knows life is hard. The Tories are waging a class war against us we’re all having to fight. But like trade unions and community organising, truly independent working-class media is a vital weapon in our armoury.

The Canary doesn’t have the budget of the corporate media. In fact, our income is over 1,000 times less than the Guardian’s. What we do have is a radical agenda that disrupts power and amplifies marginalised communities. But we can only do this with our readers’ support.

So please, help us continue to spread messages of resistance and hope. Even the smallest donation would mean the world to us.

Support us
  • Show Comments
    1. I’m stunned he had a shotgun……..UKania’s more like Amerika every day. Soon assault rifles will be on sale in you local Coop & Tesco or M&S………….why does anyone need a firearm ? The fact of anyone wanting a gun should be the reason to stop it……..

    2. Plymouth has a serious Islamophobia problem but also terrible domestic violence statistics – I know of one woman there who was disowned by her family after leaving for Tunisia and a Muslim man when they had seemingly tolerated the fact that her previous eight white boyfriends had _all_ been violent to her.

      I do wonder what the living room conversations have been like in Plymouth now that they’ve been faced with the ‘wrong kind of shooting’.

      ‘Incel culture’ is grim enough. I’ve viewed a couple of forums and joined one twice on a mole basis to end up baiting the leader and then to be banned. But what underlies these ideas is a shared, enforcedly shared, corruption of sexuality and the romantic faculties under aggressive capitalism, that are simply dormant where men and women play the game. What this killer has done was done with a specific pair of hands but there must be women in Plymouth near some point of exiting the deep Stockhollm Syndrome in the Plymouth air who must know that as terrible as the incident has been it was an inevitable eruption of the city’s norms.

    Leave a Reply

    Join the conversation

    Please read our comment moderation policy here.