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Simmering tension threatened to erupt into violence in Liverpool last night as police confronted bitterness and anger among residents in the community that was home to Rhys Jones.

The 11-year-old schoolboy’s murder has exposed a widening divide between Merseyside Police and those who live in the Croxteth Park area of the city.

Local people complained that the force had failed to address concerns about gang-related crime. Police responded by expressing their frustration at the lack of information emerging from the community, which was hampering their efforts to track down Rhys’s killer.

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BACKGROUND

• Factfile: teenagers gunned down across UK

• Three murders in four days in South London

• We Shall Overcome, protesters sing at peace vigil

Related Links

• Gang war raged throughout Rhys’s short life

• ‘Our family is still not able to cope’

• How worried should we be about gun crime?

Multimedia

• Pictures: Rhys Jones shooting

They announced yesterday that the murder weapon was a black handgun with a long barrel. But the arrest of a 16-year-old youth, the third person to be arrested in connection with the schoolboy’s death, increased confusion about the progress of the murder inquiry.

Detectives have said that they are seeking a slim, white boy, aged between 13 and 15, who escaped on a BMX bike after firing three shots at Rhys in the car park of the Fir Tree pub. A bike found abandoned in another area of Liverpool was being examined last night.

Fears that Rhys’s death could trigger a battle between rival drugs gangs grew stronger with the news that police had adopted stop-and-search powers which by law can only be adopted “in anticipation of violence”. Officers have been ordered to wear stab-proof vests when patrolling the estate where Rhys lived.

Sources admitted that reprisals were possible in the wake of the killing. One officer said: “Everything is not good. We are really worried that there could be retaliatory killings between gangs. Then everything could spiral.”

Patricia Gallan, Assistant Chief Constable of Merseyside Police, appealed yesterday for locals to find the courage to come forward with information about the murder. “The answers are within the community,” she said. “This boy was an innocent and we need the help of everyone in this community to tell us who is responsible for this crime. I need more help.”

Some residents hit back by claiming that Rhys might still be alive had police shown a greater determination to protect them. Although he lived and died in a relatively affluent area of the city, Croxteth Park is sandwiched by the troubled council estates of Norris Green and Croxteth.

Both have high crime rates and problems with drug-dealing gangs. Gun violence is common and the area is notoriously difficult to police as teenage gang members who visit the area to commit crimes are able to use a network of walkways and surrounding fields to make their escape on quad bikes and bicycles.

Dave Saville, the chairman of the Croxteth Park residents’ association, said: “Whoever killed Rhys could have been out of the estate and back in Norris Green or Croxteth in minutes.”

As well as vainly requesting the closure of such escape routes, residents said that they had called for a mobile police station on the very street where Rhys was murdered. Community leaders met with police and councillors last year and offered to raise the £20,000 needed to pay for a “pod”, to be manned between 8pm and midnight. However, they were informed that the police could not provide officers to man it.

Instead, they were promised a “City Watch” camera to monitor the street and the area around the Fir Tree pub. The announcement was made in February but the camera will not be ready until next month.

Mr Saville said: “If that camera had been installed, it would have captured the whole incident. I am angry that the ‘pod’ was not put in as well. All we wanted was a police presence. The manager of the pub even said he would fund the maintenance of it.

“I said in May at a police authority meeting, ‘Does a child need to be shot before something is done?’ ”

As the community and police accused each other of a lack of cooperation, Rhys’s parents visited the scene of his death and wept as they viewed the growing collection of tributes, including Everton football shirts, scarves and pennants left in memory of their football-loving son. Stephen and Melanie Jones delivered their own bouquet of blue roses and gerberas.

Their message read: “Goodnight and God bless, son, till we meet again. All our love and kisses, from mum, dad and Owen.”

Everton FC will hold a minute’s silence before their Premiership match at home to Blackburn Rovers today. Players from both teams will wear black armbands. David Moyes, the Everton manager, and the club captain Phil Neville appealed for the public to provide more information.

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