IT was a drive-by shooting at a 2003 New Years party that left two innocent girls dead.
Best friends Charlene Ellis, 18, and Letisha Shakespeare, 17, were outside a salon in Aston, Birmingham, when a hail of bullets from a MAC-10 machine pistol ripped through the air.
SWNSCheryl Shaw, Charlene and Sophie Ellis and Letisha Shakespeare were caught in crossfire amid an organised crime war between rival crews[/caption]
West Midlands PoliceAt the head of the gang was a ‘notorious’ shadowy Godfather figure called Nosakhere “Nosa” Stephenson[/caption]
Members of the Burger Bar Boys gang have terrorised Birmingham
Moments later, shots from the same red Ford Mondeo rung out as a gunman wielding a 9mm 1944 Spanish Llama pistol shot at a Ford Orion car.
Charlene and Letisha were killed while Charlene’s twin sister Sophie Ellis and her cousin Cheryl Shaw escaped with injuries.
Four of those responsible for the January 3 killings were jailed for life.
One of them, shockingly, was Marcus Ellis, 24, Charlene’s half-brother.
Two remain on the run to this day.
But what brought a group of men in their twenties to carry out a killing considered a “turning point” in UK street crime?
The story begins after the Handsworth riots of 1985, sparked by the arrest of a man and a police raid on a pub.
In the months that followed, a group of young men brought together amid the chaos turned to drug dealing and running security for nightclubs across Birmingham.
They called themselves the Johnson Crew, thought to be named after a cafe on nearby Heathfield Road but a fallout saw them splinter and a new group, the Burger Bar Boys, named after a restaurant on Soho Road, emerged.
What followed would be three decades of murder, shootings and turf wars in a bloody gangland feud which wreaked havoc across the West Midlands.
The Burger Bar Boys were so barbaric they used rape as a punishment for racking up drug debts.
‘UNTOUCHABLE’
At the head of the gang was a “notorious” shadowy Godfather figure called Nosakhere “Nosa” Stephenson.
Stephenson considered himself “untouchable” and as the “go to” man for trafficking guns, especially antique firearms and specially-made ammo, he flooded Birmingham with weapons.
Selling guns for around £3,000 each, Stephenson developed what one judge branded “significant influence over others”.
His power made it easy to “command respect and allegiance” from young gangsters, James Burbidge QC said.
This influence, according to criminologist David Wilson, was crucial in the Burgers Bar Boys’ ability to groom young men to carry out their dirty work.
He told The Sun: “The shadowy figure becomes this kind of male role model, this negative perverted male role model, many other young men will have through somebody who is a sports star, or a community leader or a teacher.
“But they don’t get lots from those positive role models, the sense of a father figure. They get it from this, this guy who’s already on a hierarchy, which we call a gang.”
It is also the lure of “eye-watering” payouts for peddling drugs that sees young men free fall into a life of crime which they struggle to break free.
They were raping people for reputation building and as punishment for drug debts, not paying up on time
Undercover cop Neil Woods
The Boys would also carry out intimidation sessions inside an infamous Northampton snooker hall, experienced first hand by undercover officer Neil Woods who infiltrated them.
He told The Sun in 2019: “They were raping people for reputation building and as punishment for drug debts, not paying up on time.
“I had a samurai sword to my throat, I had a knife pressed into my groin, I had somebody trying to run me over in a car, I’ve been threatened and felt I was about to be killed quite a few times.”
The barbarity by which Stephenson ran the Burger Bar Boys was realised shortly after the murder of Charlene and Letisha.
The intended target was Johnson Crew gangster Jermaine Carty, 23, who that night had provoked gang rivals on stage at a nightclub.
Police later said the girls, standing next to Carty outside a hair salon in Birchfield Road at the time of the shooting, were deliberately targeted for their links to the Johnsons.
Their deaths were part of a revenge killing plot for the murder of Yohanne Martin, 24.
Martin was shot in the head by Johnson Crew thug Kieron Richards, 16, as he waited in his Mercedes-Benz at traffic lights in December 2002.
Charlene’s stepfather, Arthur Ellis, once known as Super D, had been a key member of the gang and served time for the manslaughter of Kevin Powell, the leader of the Burger Bar Boys, in 1994.
A member of the Burger Bar Boys said at the time: “The Johnsons showed us (that) little bitches could shoot.
“We showed them they could be shot, too. There’s a new saying in the Burger Bars: ‘This is a unisex gun’.”
‘DEVASTATION CAUSED’
Marcus Ellis, Michael Gregory, Nathan Martin and Rodrigo Simms were jailed for murder.
Both gangs made a truce in 2010 and it was suggested a “super-gang” had been formed.
By mid 2015 onwards, around 20 shootings linked to both gangs suggested this peace deal was over.
That year, Stephenson’s luck ran out.
Police had been monitoring him in a huge undercover operation and managed to intercept five gun shipments between suppliers to buyers.
These included a MAC-10 machine gun, capable of firing 30 rounds in under two seconds, and a pump action shotgun, found buried in a garden in Aston, as well as thousands of rounds of ammunition.
Police said they would have prevented “many” murders as a result of the operation.
Sentencing him to 16 years, Judge James Burbidge QC said: “You must know about the devastation caused to other families in your community when weapons have been used.
“The fact you must know that, yet still ply this trade, is beyond belief.”
Stephenson’s sentence was considered too lenient by then Solicitor General, MP Robert Buckland, who had it increased to 22 years at the Court of Appeal.
Det Chief Superintendent Kenny Bell, from West Midlands Police, said: “Nosa Stephenson and his gang presented a very real and dangerous threat to the people of Birmingham and the West Midlands.”
He added how in the six months to the end of January 2016 his force arrested 261 people for firearms offences and seized “dozens of guns”.
This, DCS Bell said, was “a result of our relentless efforts to disrupt networks like Stephenson’s”.
Both gangs remain active in Birmingham.
West Midlands PoliceSelling guns for around £3,000 each, Nosakhere Stephenson developed what one judge branded ‘significant influence over others’[/caption]
BPMThe Burger Bar Boys took their name from an outlet on Birmingham’s Soho Road[/caption]
Marcus Ellis, Michael Gregory, Nathan Martin and Rodrigo Simms were jailed for murder Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
