Riots revealed vital role of E&S

Local Newspaper Week starts today. SHAUN JEPSON examines the Express & Star's major role in helping the victims of last year's riots.

Anyone doubting the relevance of local newspapers only has to look back to the summer riots that rocked the West Midlands.

The Express & Star was on hand to cover every aspect of it, was there to support the victims as they attempted to pick up the remains of their businesses, and played a huge part in helping in operations to capture those responsible.

Hard news has always been the bread and butter of the newspaper. But it is the character of the people of the West Midlands and Staffordshire that brings those news stories to life.

This week, to mark Local Newspaper Week, we will be focusing on some of the people whose lives have been touched by the Express & Star.

One of those is grandmother Louise Johnson, whose courage captured the imagination of a nation during the riots.

She was pictured in the paper saving her Louise's Hair Salon in Queen Street, Wolverhampton, from the mob by standing on the street in front of it and warning rioters to keep away.

The 52-year-old mother-of-four, from Heath Town, who was given an Express & Star Local Hero Award in honour of her defiance that day, said: "The riots were covered really well.

"It was comforting to see people that were involved were being named and shamed and that the paper had a big role in encouraging witnesses to come forward.

"Knowing the rioters would be prosecuted and put in the paper will hopefully act as a deterrent to stop people from doing this sort of thing again."

Many of the images the newspaper captured as trouble unfolded across Wolverhampton, West Bromwich and Birmingham helped police secure scores of convictions against those responsible.

Det Sgt Mark Rushton, along with more than 50 police colleagues, was charged with the painstaking task of analysing hours of CCTV footage and still images captured during the disturbances. He said: "We had a couple of examples of the Express & Star's power – in particular we had a mother who dragged her son to a police station clutching a copy of the paper having seen his image in there.

"He was bang to rights because of the quality of the picture.

"I think the massive advantage we had is that the images from the paper were of such a high quality that it was just too difficult for people to deny it was them.

"Other images from CCTV footage were grainy in comparison to the images we had from the Express & Star."

As well as providing police with images from the riots, the newspaper was invited to attend dawn-raids at the homes of suspects as police stepped up their efforts to catch people responsible.

And the newspaper also ensured offenders were named and shamed in the newspaper when they appeared at court hearings.

For many victims, reading reports of punishment being handed to those who took part in the shocking scenes has been comforting – part of the healing process as they recover from some of the most shocking scenes this region has ever seen.