The spectre of Birmingham's most notorious street gangs continues to cast a long shadow over the city in 2025, with high-profile court cases revealing how their poisonous legacy fuels ongoing violence.
A Legacy of Violence in New Court Cases
Despite police assertions that the original Burger Bar Boys and Johnson Crew are defunct, their names and territorial disputes were central to major trials this year. The gangs, named after food outlets in Handsworth and Lozells where they formed in the 1980s, were once responsible for weekly shootings, earning Birmingham an unwanted reputation as the UK's 'gun capital'.
While dedicated police operations and key arrests were believed to have vanquished the groups, senseless violence and death in the same city districts keep their history in the headlines. West Midlands Police confidently state the old gangs are not back, but the dynamics they created persist.
New Gangs, Old Postcode Wars
This persistence was starkly illustrated in the case of Ishmael Farquharson, jailed in September 2025 for killing 16-year-old Sekou Doucoure on July 12, 2022. Farquharson stabbed the teenager on a Newtown petrol station forecourt. The build-up to the attack revealed a modern landscape shaped by historic rivalries.
Sekou was a prominent young member of a gang called Get Round Der (GRD), associated with B20 postcode areas of Perry Barr and Handsworth Wood—historically Burger Bar Boy territory. Prosecutors said Sekou and a friend deliberately rode into Lozells, an area now claimed by the 9Boyz but traditionally Johnson Crew turf, to provoke confrontation.
PC Gareth Evans, a gang expert for West Midlands Police since 2010, gave evidence at the trial. Asked if the original gangs still exist, he stated: "No. Not really. I wouldn't say so." He explained they have "morphed" into younger peer groups who affiliate themselves with the areas, often unaware of the full historical context but fiercely loyal to their postcodes.
Digital Turf Wars and Tragic Consequences
PC Evans detailed how rivalries now play out online on platforms like Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, often through provocative drill rap videos. The confrontation that led to Sekou's death involved rivals Pierre Thomas ('P.Dot') and Fardi Jafal ('Cadz'), both later jailed for manslaughter in 2023. Their trial heard how vulnerable children as young as 10 were groomed by hardened gangsters.
Another case in 2025 underscored the enduring cycle. Meshaq Berryman was sentenced to life with a minimum of 24 years for a drive-by shooting at a wake in Handsworth. The 9Boyz gangster shot three teenagers mourning 17-year-old knife crime victim Akeem Bailey, whose brother was linked to a gang called Armed Response—another descendant of the Burger Bar Boys.
Judge Melbourne Inman KC, passing sentence, described it as a "depressingly familiar situation," adding that gang violence remains a "scourge" of the city.
Four decades after the birth of the Burger Bar Boys and Johnson Crew, the same parts of Birmingham remain divided. While the names have changed, the penchant for defending postcode territories with extreme violence has not. Young people are still being shot, stabbed, and killed, and crown court juries are still being given history lessons on gangs thought to be consigned to the past.
