They were the baby-faced troublemakers who terrorised Britain’s streets.
From the infamous ‘Asbros’ who brought mayhem to their community, to the ‘Ratboy’ burglar who received his first caution at the age of 10, the notorious ‘ASBO Kids’ became the poster boys for youth street crime.
The ASBO, or anti-social behavioural order, was introduced by Sir Tony Blair’s Government in 1998 as a way to deter crime by putting a curfew on an individual and banning them from certain places.
Mugshots of children as young as 10 were plastered across newspapers in the hopes that a public shaming might teach them a lesson, and provide some sense of justice for the neighbourhoods they terrorised.
But for many yobs it became a badge of honour, and more than half of those who received one would breach its conditions.
The ASBOs were scrapped in 2014 by Lord Cameron’s Coalition Government, and replaced in England, Wales and Northern Ireland with civil injunctions and criminal behaviour orders.
Now Keir Starmer’s Labour is proposing to revive the Blair-era orders if it wins the General Election. The new ASBOs would give police powers to use ‘respect orders’ against perpetrators of harassment, intimidating behaviour, drug use, littering and street drinking.
Breaching the orders would be a criminal offence and could lead to convictions being issued with anything from a community payback order to a custodial sentence. New orders would only be used against adults and persistent offenders.
Here, MailOnline takes a look at the original ASBO kids.
The ‘Asbros’ Danny and Ricky Oakley ran riot around their neighbourhood in Park Village, Wolverhampton when they were 11 and 12 (pictured)
Danny Oakley (pictured last year) in the area of Wolverhampton where he once ran riot
The ‘Asbros’: Daniel and Ricky Oakley
Daniel Oakley racked up 40 arrests with his brother Ricky before they became known as the ‘demons from hell’ in their neighbourhood of Park Village in Wolverhampton.
The siblings became the youngest recipients of anti-social behaviour orders in 2006, prompting them to become known as ‘Asbros’.
Their reign of terror included throwing knives, starting fires and letting down tyres, before they began carrying out robberies and burglaries. On one occasion, the duo suffered severe burns after Ricky threw a can of foam on a fire and it exploded.
Speaking to MailOnline previously, Danny recalled: ‘That was just the start of it. There was a big explosion that’s for sure, we were walking down our road with smouldering hair and no eyebrows… I’ve come a long way from where I was.’
In 2015 – his brother Ricky was in prison – while Danny, then 29, vowed to start afresh and said he planned to help steer other youngsters away from street gangs.
‘Classic psychopath’: Joseph McCann
The five McCann brothers helped turn Greater Manchester into the ASBO capital of Britain thanks to their ‘terrorising’ antics, spearheaded by ‘psychopath’ Joseph McCann.
The siblings were said to leave neighbours cowering in their wake, but a handful kept files of evidence on the boys while council bosses set up a video camera after receiving so many complaints.
They were caught on CCTV wrecking cars, throwing bricks at workers and vandalising property, leading Manchester City Council to evict the whole family on the grounds of breach of tenancy.
Despite being shipped two miles away to Ardwick, the brothers continued to return to Beswick just to raise hell, leading to Joseph receiving an ASBO aged 14 in 1999, alongside brothers Sean, 16 and Michael, 13.
A year after the ASBOs were issued, burglaries in Beswick had halved and takings in its shopping precinct were up. But for Joseph, at least, the orders had no impact on his criminal desires.
Sean McCann is pictured (centre) in Manchester in 1999
Michael (left) and Joseph McCann (right) arriving at court after they applied to overturn an anti-social behaviour order against them
Joseph McCann was jailed for carrying out a horrific campaign of kidnappings, rapes and sex attacks
In 2008, he was jailed for nine years for aggravated burglary after forcing his way into an 85-year-old man’s home in Bedford and threatening him with a knife.
He failed to be rehabilitated and after his release he was arrested again for burglary in August 2017 and given a three-and-a-half year jail term.
But after 18 months behind bars, he was released early by the authorities in error, allowing him to embark on a 15-day rampage of rape, violence and abduction.
A judge described him as a ‘classic psychopath’ as he dealt him 33 life sentences in 2019 after he targeted 11 victims aged 11 to 71 in Greater Manchester, Ramsbottom and London.
‘Ratboy’ Anthony Kennedy
Anthony Kennedy, aka Ratboy, received his first caution at the age of 10 for terrorising the Byker Wall estate in Newcastle in the 1990s.
Between the ages of 11 and 13, he was arrested 16 times and appeared in court three times for offences including burglary, theft, taking a car without consent and other driving offences.
He earned the nickname Ratboy after being found by police hiding in a ventilation shaft.
In 2007, Kennedy claimed to have given up a life of crime after finding love and religion. He and his partner moved to Blyth, Northumberland, to have a fresh start.
He said at the time: ‘I believe it’s important to treat others how you would like to be treated yourself and to have respect for other people.
‘When I was Ratboy, those were things I didn’t care about.’
‘Ratboy is the person I used to be,’ he professed at the time.
‘The only names I want to be called now are Anthony and Dad. I’ve turned my back on crime and would never go back to that life. I’ve got too much to lose.’
Kennedy was jailed in 2018 after a botched burglary saw him leave a trail of blood across his victim’s home.
Judge Robert Spragg jailed Kennedy for three years and four months, adding he was ‘turning into a career burglar’.
Kennedy entered a home in Kensington Gardens, Monkseaton, where he smashed a century old glass panel in the front door and left a trail of blood as he scoured the house.
Rachel Masters, prosecuting at the time, said the victim returned the following day to find his home ransacked.
Sentimental items had been stolen including watches worth £750 – one of which was 35 years old and of significant sentimental value.
Anthony Kennedy (pictured in 2018) made headlines nationwide as a baby-faced schoolboy who terrorised the Byker Wall estate in Newcastle in the 1990s
Anthony Kennedy, ‘Ratboy’, who received his first caution at the age of 10 for terrorising the Byker Wall estate in Newcastle in the 1990s
Alfie Hodgin, pictured aged ten in 2014 (left), was one of the youngest people to receive an ASBO. He was jailed aged 18 (right) after being caught with more than £2,000 of heroin and crack cocaine while ‘slumped on the floor covered in blood’ following a revenge attack.
At 14, he admitted burglary and head butting a policeman in the face during a campaign of terror against elderly women.
Sticking to his modus operandi, he was jailed at 17 for four years for robbing a pensioner, and was moved to an adult prison a year later to serve out the rest of his sentence. He was sentenced a further three times for burglary at the ages of 20, 24 and 26.
In 2007, Kennedy claimed to have given up a life of crime after finding love and religion. He and his partner moved to Blyth, Northumberland, to have a fresh start.
Alfie Hodgin
At just 10 years old, Alfie Hodgin was one of the youngest people ever to receive an anti-social behaviour order – but it appears it did little to change his behaviour.
In October 2022 he was jailed after he tried to become a drug gang boss but was stabbed 27 times with a machete in a revenge attack.
The 18-year-old was locked up after he was caught with £2,320 of heroin and crack cocaine while ‘slumped on the floor covered in blood’ in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire.
The teenager from Liscard, Merseyside, was working for an organised crime group in a bid to pay off debt he had accumulated but he instead stole the gang’s phone and drugs as he attempted to run his own operation.
Liverpool Crown Court heard how a gang of four machete-wielding men left Hodgin lying in a pool of his own blood on July 14 with 27 stab wounds.
Reports at the time heard that dozens of police cars responding to the incident which saw the attackers jump out at Hodgin out of a grey SUV.
He spent two weeks in hospital due to the severity of his injuries having been rescued by an air ambulance. Prosecutor Derek Jones told the court Hodgin had ‘clearly been subjected to a serious assault with weapons, thought to be machetes’.
But he would be arrested by officers who found him in the possession of £1,220 of heroin, £1,100 of crack cocaine and a £1,208 ‘graft’ phone.
Hodgin admitted possession of heroin and crack cocaine with intent to supply and being concerned in the supply of the drugs as he was sentenced to two-and-a-half years.
Kyle and Calvin Hooper
Kyle and Calvin Hooper were aged just 12 and 10 respectively when they were handed ASBOs for terrorising their Newport neighbourhood.
The order was imposed for five years after they threw bricks at moving buses, launched bottles and eggs and local residents and workers and shot at people with an air pistol.
Kyle once swung a metal bar at a woman after she challenged a group of youths who were causing a disturbance, a court heard.
The siblings were involved in 44 incidents over a 14-month period before being handed their first ASBOs in January 2005.
Kyle (right) and Calvin Hooper were aged just 12 and 10 respectively when they were handed ASBOs for terrorising their Newport neighbourhood
Kyle (pictured) once swung a metal bar at a woman after she challenged a group of youths who were causing a disturbance, a court heard
They would find themselves in front of the court again, however, when they each received a two-year ASBO in March 2014.
They were banned from meeting up with certain friends who they had caused trouble with and could not gather in a group of more than three people.
The brothers were also banned from entering certain areas.
Almost a decade later, and Kyle, at least, appears to have stayed out of trouble after having a son.
He regularly posts pictures with friends on social media and helps run a local football club.
MailOnline has reached out to Kyle for comment.
In 2019, a Calvin Hooper was convicted of being in possession of cannabis with intent to supply. [CHECK]
He was jailed in 2020 for breaching the terms of his community order.
Craig Fletcher
Craig Fletcher is currently serving a life sentence with a minimum term of of 25 years after carrying out the brutal murder of a father on Boxing Day in 2018.
At 15, he was the first in Redcar and Cleveland to be slapped with an ASBO for tormenting locals in South Bank in 2001 – before receiving his second order just three years later.
In May 2004, the same year as his second ASBO, he was jailed for three years after asking a ‘naive and vulnerable’ deaf man to give him lift early one morning – before violently robbing him of his car, which was later found burned out.
Undeterred and clearly not rehabilitated, Fletcher grinned in the dock in 2018 when the then-21-year-old was jailed for two years and nine months for a horrifying assault on a 16-year-old boy.
Craig Fletcher arriving a Teesside Magistrate’s Court to receive his ASBO aged 15
Craig Fletcher, 33 (pictured), of Eston, was handed a life sentence, with a 25 years minimum term for his part in the murder. He filmed the attack on his mobile phone. The footage was shown to Teeside Crown Court – but it was so graphic, the public gallery was cleared as it was played
Fletcher and two other men aged 18 and 19 kicked and punched the boy to within an inch of his life before dragging him into a field – robbing him of just £9 and a mobile phone.
The year before he became a murderer, Fletcher vowed his criminal career was a thing of the past, telling Teesside Live he wanted to focus on his young family.
‘I got my ASBO because, basically, I was a little nuisance,’ Fletcher said.
‘I was going around smashing windows and drinking in the streets, I was out of control. I’m getting texts off people who I used to have problems with saying ”let’s bury the hatchet”.
‘I’ve changed my ways, and everyone deserves a chance at turning over a new leaf.’
A year later, Fletcher and his accomplice Craig Barstow faced Teesside Crown Court for the killing of Gavin Barnes, 35, which they filmed in Fletcher’s Eston High Street flat.
Both men had previously admitted the murder. Barstow, 31, of South Bank, was given a life sentence with a minimum term of 26-and-a-half years.
Prosecutor Peter Makepeace QC told the court Mr Barnes died from a severe blunt force head injury with multiple impacts to the head causing skull and facial fractures, brain damage and severe swelling.
A postmortem carried out on Mr Barnes found 105 injuries were inflicted on his body including bone fractures and broken ribs, The Mirror reported.
Mr Makepeace described how the victim, who had issues with alcohol and relapsed on Christmas Day, was sleeping rough in Eston Square after a falling out with his girlfriend and had been drinking with Fletcher and Barstow.
But at some point, the court heard, Barstow took drunken exception to Mr Barnes for no good reason – and launched into a sustained, torturous attack.
Footage of the murder taken from Fletcher’s own mobile phone was shown to the court – but it was so graphic, the public gallery was cleared as it was played.
In the footage shown in court, both murderers were ‘laughing throughout’ the attack. After further degrading and sadistic attacks, Fletcher said: ‘I video-recorded a murder. Finish him off then’ (Pictured: forensics at the scene of the brutal 2018 attack)
Simon Bourne Arton QC said told the men in court: ‘Gavin Barnes was 35 when he died. He was 35 when you killed him… No sentence I impose upon you can begin to compensate his family and his friends. Nothing I do or say can help them in their grief.’ (Pictured: Gavin Barnes)
It showed the victim lying on the kitchen floor in a dishevelled state and then, two hours later at around 6.30pm, it again showed Mr Barnes had ‘received a very severe beating and is utterly helpless’.
The footage showed Barstow dragging Mr Barnes along a corridor, Fletcher was filming and commentating throughout, sometimes taking part in the violence.
Mr Barnes was in distress and unable to speak or make coherent noise except ‘guttural expressions of pain’.
Both murderers were ‘laughing throughout’ the attack, they slapped him and Barstow kicked him with steel toe-capped rigger boots.
Fletcher could be heard saying: ‘He’s hanging on for a long time this kid isn’t he.’
The footage then shows Barstow dragging Mr Barnes from the flat by his underwear shouting ‘Google me’.
He slammed the door on Mr Barnes’ lifeless body and looked up at the camera smiling.
Both were laughing, Barstow saying: ‘I told him not to wind me up he started it.’ Fletcher filmed blood on himself and said: ‘Looks like a murder scene.’
At one point, a dog bowl was placed in front of the helpless victim. After further degrading and sadistic attacks, Fletcher said: ‘I video-recorded a murder. Finish him off then.’
Barstow replied: ‘He’s dead.’ The violence lasted more than three hours.
Declan Madigan
He was labelled a ‘one-boy crime wave’ back in 2000 after being arrested 100 times for violent crime, burglary and car theft when he was just a teenager.
But Declan Madigan, who was 14 when he was handed an ASBO, seems to have finally got his life in order following a stint in prison.
He was jailed for 11 years in 2014 after being convicted of a drive-by shooting and drug offences in Nottingham.
He had been paralysed from the waist-down in an earlier car crash but ordered two others to fire shots at an empty house, the court heard.
Declan Madigan (pictured outside court aged 16), who was 14 when he was handed an ASBO, seems to have finally got his life in order following a stint in prison
Madigan’s barrister Lisa Hardy told Nottingham Crown Court: ‘He doesn’t want his children to have the life he has had.’ (Pictured: Madigan in a recent selfie)
The career criminal vowed to change his ways when he was released early in 2018, telling a judge he was ‘desperate to stay out of prison’ so that he could settle down and raise a family.
His barrister Lisa Hardy told Nottingham Crown Court: ‘He doesn’t want his children to have the life he has had.’
Madigan – a man with 26 convictions for 149 offences – was ‘frightened to death, it is fair to say, of being sent back to prison for any reason at all’, added Mrs Hardy.
Madigan has stayed true to his word and has remained out of prison, sharing a smiling selfie on Facebook as recently as this week.
‘Young and Deadly’
A gang of baby-faced teenagers called ‘Young and Deadly’ were named and shamed by police and banned from meeting up in public for two years.
The group – some as as young as 13 – have plagued a town’s streets with violence and anti-social behaviour towards their victims.
One school even wrote to parents to warn that ‘Young and Deadly’ gang members were targeting vulnerable pupils with attacks.
But six members – from 13 to 17 – have been named and pictured by police after being issued with Criminal Behaviour Orders (CBOs).
Jackson Price, 13, Archie McCarthy, 14, Cody Bond, 15, Charlie Pearce, 16, Daniel Watkins, 16, and Tyler Hammonds, 17, have been banned from meeting up with other people in public.
Tyler Hammonds, 17, pictured left, and Jackson Price, 13, were part of the gang
The Young and Deadly gang, all from Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, must abide by the order for two years and cannot meet up with more than two other people under the age of 21.
The gang has spread fear and caused chaos in the town, according to previous press reports.
One woman claimed her mum has been left too scared to walk her dog. She said: ‘My 60-year-old mum was terrified to walk her dog down the river – something she does every day.
‘[Recently] they were harassing people. Enough is enough. Sort these wannabe gangsters out before they stab someone for a laugh,’ she said.
Another mother said her 13-year-old son was attacked and left bleeding in the street. The boy was alone when he was left bleeding from the mouth and filmed on Snapchat helplessly wiping blood from his face with his hands.
His mum, choosing to remain anonymous, revealed how she made the rare decision to allow her son to walk into the town centre alone to meet a girl from school.
She explained: ‘My son was left covered in blood, on his own with a girl against all those boys. Look at the blood pouring out of his mouth, it was literally him and that girl with about 10 boys. I never let him go to town either. I only let him go because he was meeting a girl from school.’
The furious mum said she was told about other attacks on vulnerable people in the town centre after contacting police.
She added: ‘Even the police have actually informed me that they’ve attacked women, homeless people and men. They are very dangerous, carrying knives around too.
‘I have video evidence of them all attacking children, pictures of all the children and their parents. I have Snapchat conversations between them all. I’ve contacted all their parents but nobody will do anything. The children are of all ages from 12-17.’
Charlie Pearce, 16, and Cody Bond, 15, have been served with Criminal Behaviour Orders
Archie McCarthy, 14, and Daniel Watkins, 16, caused chaos in their hometown, Merthyr Tydfil
Local Policing Inspector Jon Duckham said: ‘Criminal Behaviour Orders [CBO] enable us to deal with persistent troublemakers quickly – either they comply, and accept the help available to them, or they breach the CBO and find themselves arrested and back in court.
‘It’s really unfortunate that the repetitive nature of the offending meant that we were compelled to take such action as a preventative measure.
‘I hope the issuing of these orders offers reassurance to the community, along with a level of safeguarding and a chance to improve the behaviour of the boys concerned.’
Earlier this year, Afon Taf high school wrote to parents warning of the group, saying: ‘As you may be aware, within the Merthyr area, there have been ongoing incidents. involving a group of young people who refer to themselves as YAD (Young and Deadly).
‘These incidents generally involve acts of intimidation and/or violence towards individuals – many of whom are vulnerable.
‘As a result of these incidents the police are regularly dealing with members of the group.
‘Up until now, thankfully, there has been no suggestion that any pupils who attend Afon Taf have been involved with this group and it has not had any impact on our school. However, towards the end of the school day [recently], two males who are known to have links with the group appeared outside the school gates.
‘They were seen immediately by our office staff who contacted police.’
