Croydon’s largest criminal gang has been hit hard after a series of arrests and convictions of its ringleaders.

More than 15 members of the Don’t Say Nothing gang have been taken off the streets following a proactive operation by Croydon police to rid the borough of the self-styled gang.

An operation lasting more than a year has seen Croydon police’s Operation Aries gang unit arresting gang members for the tiniest infractions up to major crimes and has led to the heads of the gang either being imprisoned or awaiting trial.

The self-styled general of the gang Joland Giwa is due to be deported from the UK back to his native Sierra Leone after serving a year in prison for robbery.

Another gang leader Ashley Sheridan was recalled to prison to serve the remainder of his 12 month sentence for burglary after recently being released.

The ringleaders have been the main target of police operations to prevent the gang becoming too entrenched in major criminal activity.

As a result street robberies in the town centre have fallen sharply and there has been a dramatic reduction in the amount of youths found in the possession of knives.

Sergeant Darin Birmingham and his Aries team have been instrumental in bringing about the downfall of a group that used violence and aggression to commit crimes and harass and bully those younger than them.

Sgt Birmingham said: “It really started by focusing on the town centre and the crimes that were taking place there. CCTV played a major role in tracking down individuals that had committed crimes.

"Even if there was no victim or we couldn’t trace one we’d work with our partners at the council to track down the people who committed the crimes and arrest them.

“We learned a lot of lessons from the town centre which we then started adapting and using in the rest of the borough.

"Working alongside the town centre police team we were able to co-ordinate our resources with them and our partners at the council.

“It’s a place where people work, come to shop and live and that’s why we started there.

“By chipping away at each member of the group and arresting them for even the most minor crimes, that gave us an in road to the families and we were able to start liasing with parents and telling them exactly what their son or daughter was getting up to.

“We’d then get to know parents and when we saw their son or daughter with their mates we'd ask them how their mum was, that soon lost a lot of them their street cred.”

The main focus area of the team has been the McDonald’s in North End. In recent months the area had become a meeting point for gang members until the Operation Aries team and the town centre police unit made it a top priority.

DSN members were predominantly involved in low level street crime such as robberies, petty thefts and acts of violence but were starting to grow in their ferocity and level of criminality.

Drug dealing, possession of firearms and an increase in tit-for-tat feuds with other gangs all pointed toward a gang war.

Historically, out of borough gangs have seen Croydon as an area to branch out into and exert their influence.

A police source said: “Croydon has never really had that much of a problem with gangs if you look at it compared to other boroughs.

"It is mainly gangs in Lambeth and Brixton fighting their wars here and recruiting the local wannabe gang members to do their work for them.

“If they want to go into an area they will hook up with the local gang and make an alliance so they can set up their crack houses and sell their drugs without ever having to set foot there.”

With the DSN gang out of the picture other gangs such as Shine My Nine and Get Money Gangsters are vying for control of the borough and are rumoured to have joined forces with the Lambeth based Poverty Driven Children (PDC).

Croydon Council cabinet member for safety and cohesion Councillor Gavin Barwell said: “Croydon police have made real progress in tackling the borough’s gangs.

"The DSN has been left fragmented and their leaders jailed but there are still people out there who claim to be part of that criminal organisation.”

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