Not since the dark heyday of the notorious Gunn family has Nottingham been gripped by a crime in such a way as on Tuesday.
The East Midlands city woke Tuesday to six areas cordoned off by police, a vast number of officers on the streets and reports of stabbings, reckless city centre driving and murder.
Now, the three violent deaths and various injured individuals have conjured up painful memories of the “Shottingham” era for residents.
The macabre moniker emerged following regular shootings, neighbourhood gang violence and prolific organised crime two decades ago. However, following the incarceration of crime boss Colin Gunn in 2006, the city has been on an upward trajectory, ridding itself of its violent reputation.
But for many, the brutal slaughter on Tuesday at two different locations will elicit the spectre of Colin Gunn and his brother David, from 20 years ago.
The brothers ran the Bestwood Cartel which specialised in cheque fraud, extortion, drug dealing and violence and ruled many Nottingham suburbs with an iron fist.
Colin Gunn offered businesses protection in exchange for money and, if people refused, their windows would be shot or destroyed with bricks. It is said that severe cocaine and steroid use led to increasingly erratic and aggressive behaviour at the turn of the millennium.
The criminal brothers viewed themselves as protectors of their turf, seeing themselves somewhat as a hybrid of Robin Hood and the Kray twins.
Violence reached a crescendo in August 2003 when Colin’s nephew, Jamie Gunn, then 19, was the passenger in a car heading home from a shift as a bouncer at the Sporting Chance pub, in Nottingham, a stronghold for the Gunn crew.
Jamie was the intended target of Michael O’Brien, a convicted criminal himself who had been slashed down his face while in prison in 2001 in a case of postcode gang wars.
O’Brien was refused entry to the Sporting Chance pub in August 2003 and later that night returned with a shotgun and tried to kill Jamie. He missed, and the driver, an innocent acquaintance of Jamie’s called Marvyn Bradshaw who happened to be driving home from the pub, instead was shot and killed.
Jamie is said to have spiralled over the next 12 months with alcohol and drug issues and died in August 2004.
Colin Gunn, the gang chief, swore revenge on O’Brien, who was later sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Revenge came in the form of the shooting of O’Brien’s parents while they were staying in Trusthorpe on the Lincolnshire coast. Both his mother and step-dad, John and Joan Stirland, were gunned down with Beretta pistols.
Nobody has been charged with their murder, but Colin Gunn was sentenced to 35 years for conspiring to murder the Stirlands.
Riots ensued around the Gunn headquarters on the Bestwood Estate, and it later emerged the Gunn family had a mole in place inside the Nottinghamshire Police force.
Official data show that two decades ago, between 2002 and 2007 there was an average of 16.6 murders a year, with a high of 21 between 2004 and 2005. However, the most recent five years has seen this figure almost halved down to 8.8, with a high of 9 in one year.
There have been eight murders so far in the first three quarters of 2022 – 2023.
Today’s dark day will see the murder tally for 2023 reach the highest for at least five years, and locals will hope it is not a harbinger of Shottingham 2.0.