Gun owners should face checks for online hate posts, says ex-police chief after Plymouth shootings

‘We need to ensure that guns do not fall into the hands of dangerous people,’ Lord Stevens says

Five people were killed by Jake Davison in a shooting spree that started on Biddick Drive in Plymouth (Getty Images)

Applicants for gun licences should face a “trawling” of their online content to understand more about them and their views, according to a former police chief.

Lord Stevens, an ex-Metropolitan Police commissioner, made the comments in the wake of a mass shooting in Plymouth, whose gunman appeared obsessed with the misogynistic “incel” subculture in social media posts.

Jake Davison killed five people – including his mother and a three-year-old girl – and injured two others before turning his gun on himself in the Keyham area of Plymouth on Thursday.

“The gunman was clearly a dangerous man – there is no doubt he was a threat,” Lord Stevens told The Sunday Telegraph.

“The videos he made should have been taken into account when he applied for a shotgun licence.”

He told the newspaper: “There needs to be trawling of online content for an in-depth assessment of who these people are and what they think.

“We need to ensure that guns do not fall into the hands of dangerous people.”

Davison’s social media activity suggested an interest in guns and America, as well as “incel” culture, which is made up of men who feel they are oppressed by women due to a perceived lack of sexual interest.

Nazir Afzal, who was previously chief crown prosecutor for the northwest, said the 22-year-old’s posts painted a picture of a man who thought women were “lesser beings”.

Speaking about misogynistic posts made by “incels” online, Lord Stevens told The Sunday Telegraph: “I would suggest people posting these kinds of comments clearly pose a concerning threat”.

Friends of the victims and politicians have been raised questions over Davison’s firearms licence and an investigation has been launched into the return of his gun – which had been taken away following an assault allegation – weeks before Thursday’s mass shooting.

According to reports, Davison‘s firearms licence was returned after he attended an anger management course.

Terry Luscombe, 68, who knew the gunman’s mother, told The Independent: “The one thing I can’t understand is how they can give him a licence for the gun. Apparently the police had altercations with him over the years.”

Sir Keir Starmer welcomed the probe by a police watchdog into why the gunman was handed back his gun weeks before the attack, but asked: “How on earth did he get a gun licence in the first place? What back-up checks were done?”

Meanwhile Plymouth MP Luke Pollard told The Independent he wanted to see a “thorough investigation” into why Davison had a gun licence.

“Why he was given back that gun? That’s the question that people in this community have,” he added.

Davison killed his mother, 51-year-old Maxine Davison, three-year-old Sophie Martyn and her father 43-year-old Lee Martyn, 59-year-old Stephen Washington and 66-year-old Kate Shepherd in Thursday’s attack, which was the UK’s first mass shooting in more than a decade.