TURF WAR VICTIM

Warring crack kids on prowl as Dami walked to his doom AN explosive
mixture of drugs and violence hung in the air as Damilola Taylor
walked home.

And police believe the murdered schoolboy strayed into a deadly feud
between the crack-cocaine gangs known as "posses".

An hour before the 10-year-old was stabbed, officers had answered
a'999 call reporting youths fighting with bottles and knives.

By the time the police got there the thugs had dispersed. But some
were still on the prowl looking for trouble.

Damilola may have been targeted for robbery by young dealers high on
their own drugs.

And when the gang found he had nothing worth stealing, they stabbed
him in the leg.

The flood of crack on to the British market has seen the price of a
crystal - known as a "rock" - plummet from pounds 20 to as low as
pounds 10 in some areas.

The North Peckham estate in south-east London, where Damilola lived
and died, is one of the most drug-riddled ghettos in the country.

In two years police have uncovered more than a dozen "crack kitchens"
on the estate.

A recent report from local police chiefs to Scotland Yard described
the area as "heaving" with crack dealers and users, many as young as
12.

Now the 60 Murder Squad officers working on the Damilola case have
received intelligence that he was an innocent victim of a vicious
struggle between rival mobs.

In the days before the killing, detectives seized over 1,000 "rocks"
of crack in a series of raids, several in Peckham, and arrested 241
suspected dealers.

Last month Customs drug investigators told their bosses they were
being "overwhelmed" by the tide of traffickers. They believe the
drugs are going to feed the new wave of crack addiction sweeping
Britain's inner-cities.

One senior Customs source said: "There is a definite link between the
huge upsurge in crack use and the death of Damilola."

Two days after Damilola was stabbed last Monday, three gunfights
linked to "crack" flared on the streets of London.

In one, a badly-wounded victim crashed his car through the back gates
of Kilburn police station to escape a hitman.

Damilola bled to death after being attacked by a gang of youths on
his way home from Oliver Goldsmith Primary School in Peckham.

Police yesterday made a new appeal for witnesses.

A group of up to 10 boys, aged about 14, was seen in the square near
the library in Peckham as Damilola left an after-school computer club.

A woman wearing a red anorak, who was with a small child, was also
walking outside the library.

Detective Superintendent David Dillnutt said: "All of these people
could be vital witnesses." Damilola's aunt Dorcas Fayeni joined the
appeal for help to catch the young Nigerian's killers. She said: "I
believe there are people here who know who did this.

"I am appealing to them, telling them they must come forward, they
must tell the police."

Earlier, 80 people went to a service at Peckham Methodist church to
pray for Damilola and his family. His parents, Gloria and Richard,
were too griefstricken to attend. The Rev Wesley Daniel told the
congregation: "In incidents such as this there are many victims, many
of whom don't recognise they are victims until much later.

"A life that we loved has been torn from us.

"This community has been torn by this tragedy.

"We pray especially today for the children of our church and children
of our community, those whose lives have been changed, have been
filled with fear and anxiety over the events of the last days." Some
in the congregation wept. Many - including Camberwell and Peckham MP
Harriet Harman - went to lay wreaths at the bleak stairwell where the
youngster died.

Police continued making door-to-door inquiries. Boys aged 12 and 13,
and a 39-year-old woman, have been released on police bail after
being arrested for questioning about the killing.

Two knives and a bloodstained broken bottle were found near the
murder scene. Last week, Britain's top policeman, Metropolitan
Commissioner Sir John Stevens revealed that 70 per cent of all crime
is now linked to drugs and 70 per cent of criminals are 17 or
younger. Seventy-two per cent of the victims are also 17 or under.

Sir John said: "We have this awful tragedy of 10-year-old Damilola
being murdered by boys not much older than he was, but our research
now shows the bulk of our criminals are children and the majority of
their victims are children."

Crack cocaine was invented in America in the mid 1980s and is now
regarded as the world's most addictive and dangerous drug.

It is a chemically altered form of cocaine and 10 times stronger.
Just one fix is enough to get hooked. But the high lasts only 10
minutes and addicts quickly feel the urge to take more.