In the UK this week, the news has featured the 18-year-old Southport triple murderer being sentenced to 52 life in prison with a minimum of 52 years, and the British Museum was subject to an insider targeted attack by a hostile former employee.
While they may appear unconnected, they have critical factors in common.
Two words connect these two very different crimes: grievance and intent.
Much has been made about the failure to prevent the Southport murders, with the UK’s Counter Terrorism Prevent programme being the focus of much of the criticism.
The subject was referred to the Prevent programme on three separate occasions to assess his interest in violent extremism. He was found not to be ideologically motivated and, therefore, not a terrorist threat. He was, however, recognised to have a fixation on violence, and he has a history of seeking to resolve his grievances with violence.
He was the subject of what he called racially motivated bullying as a young boy, calling the helpline Childline to report the fact, telling them he was taking a knife to school to protect himself. This resulted in his expulsion from school, which may have been a catalyst for his increased isolation and his Pathway to Violence.
He later returned to the school that expelled him, armed this time with a hockey stick and attacked one of his bullies, breaking his wrist. In my opinion, mindful that I do not know all the facts, the failure appears to be with the ‘obsession’ by the authorities on the issue of ideology rather than his grievances, mindset of resolving these with violence, and his intent.
The British Museum is the UK’s most popular tourist attraction, with almost 6 million visitors a year. On Saturday, it was forced to close its temporary exhibitions and part of its permanent collection following an attack on its IT system. The attack was allegedly carried out by a recently dismissed contractor who accessed the building unlawfully and shut down several systems, including its ticketing platform.
The former contractor was arrested at the venue on suspicion of burglary. It is highly likely that the motivation for the attack was his dismissal and his grievance with this. His response to his grievance is to ‘attack’ and cause significant harm to his former employee. Whilst his actions may not be considered ‘violent’ by some, it can be argued that they were aggressive, and once again, his actions can be mapped on the model of Pathway to Targeted or Intended Violence (or Act).
Typically, we think of personal grievances as having four elements: loss, humiliation, anger, and blame. If you eliminate any of those four elements, you typically don’t have a personal grievance.
Whilst we all experience grievances, we don’t all choose to act on them or develop the intent to be violent. However, for some, they conclude that the only way they can resolve their grievance is through violence. For some this will be their learned process of dealing with a conflict, for others they will consider that they have exhausted all reasonable steps to resolve their grievance and therefore violence is the only other option. It is important not to get too wrapped up with the word ‘violence’ as this can mean different things to different people. I suggest replacing the word ‘violence’ with ‘action’.
This ‘act’ will likely be intended or targeted, so it won’t be random or impulsive. It will be considered, planned, and, in many cases, devoid of emotion. Calhoun and Weston created the ‘Pathway to Intended or Targeted Violence (Act)’ model and published it in their 2016 publication, ‘Threat Assessment and Management Strategies’. They have kindly allowed me to amend their model.
This model creates a visual map of the process that many take from their initial grievance to carrying out their act. It is a model that relates to human behaviour, so it is not rigid or pre-determined. It allows behavioural assessment and management practitioners to see the process as a journey in which interventions are possible.
This process is equally applicable to prevent lone actors from carrying out violent attacks as it is to identify how problematic people can target the workplace and cause physical, psychological and/or reputational harm to organisations.
In my opinion, the critical element is not ideology; it understands the grievance a person of concern has, preventing them from developing and acting on their intent to cause intended harm and diverting them off that ‘journey’.
