An ex-offender turned charity worker says the lockdown provides an opportunity for teenagers to escape a life of crime, but a fast response is needed as gangs alter their tactics.

Former gang member Lennox Rodgers now runs Dartford based crime prevention charity Refocus and has been offering advice and guidance to youngsters involved in drug misuse.

He challenged the perception youth crime was on the decrease instead arguing it was going largely unreported amid the restrictions on movement imposed by Covid-19.

It comes as access was restricted to parks and open spaces in Dartford and Medway last month in response to concerns young people were engaging in drug taking and disobeying social distancing guidelines.

But government restrictions have been eased and Lennox says county lines drug dealers here in Kent have been altering their tactics accordingly.

He said in many ways crime of this kind had got worse as the lockdown provides ample opportunities for gangs to disguise their behaviour.

This includes posing as delivery drivers to deliver drugs on doorstops and meeting in supermarket car parks where gatherings of vehicles are less suspicious.

"It is not getting reported like it was before," he said. "The problem has not changed."

"They are putting on a high vis or have them green jackets on and they make out they are delivering food shopping."

He identified Central Park in Dartford and the areas around the Cygnet Leisure centre car park in Northfleet as key "hotspots" where bored teenagers were getting involving in drug taking, knife crime and were susceptible to the influence of gangs.

"Kids miss the social side. They find it hard doing Facetime calls, they like to get together and have that interaction and parents don't know what they are getting up to," he said.

"Boys get sexually abused and beaten up," he said. "When they get sexually abused they (gangs) film it and threaten to show their families and friends."

He said the gangs would also sit outside their homes and take photos of family members to blackmail them with.

This week Lennox has been busy advising a 19-year-old who was arrested for having some cannabis on him.

But the youth worker says it has been frustrating during his daily exercise and trips to the supermarket to see kids he usually works with out taking drugs and defying the rules on gatherings.

He recalls an encounter with one boy he worked with before at a Subway inside a petrol garage who had been out smoking weed with friends.

"He looked terrible," he said. "Where I was working with him before he had been expelled from school."

"I have been able to talk to him and keep in touch through phone calls."

Despite this Lennox believes the pandemic provides the chance for many kids to turn away from drugs and break away from county lines gangs.

"The lockdown is a fantastic opportunity to get away from gangs."

"The lockdown is a fantastic opportunity to get away from gangs," he said.

He advised young people caught up in it to stay away from Snapchat and other forms of unencrypted social media where they are targeted.

If possible when restrictions are further eased he also encouraged them to stay with other family members or friends to isolate themselves from their current environment.

Meanwhile Lennox says it has been difficult to get out and reach people because of where his charity falls within the government guidelines.

"The government has not opened the door for services like mine to go round and engage with them."

"We are still waiting on government guidelines to change to allow us to go out and speak to them."

"I was asked by the kids (at Dartford park) to come back. I would like to do that but I have to know when the guidelines allow this."

The charity worker believes he is ideally placed to reach out to those affected because of his own background in crime.

Lennox was recently nominated for a National Diversity Award for his work keeping troubled youths off the street.

But life has not always been so rosy for the man who grew up in Oxford to Caribbean parents and was nicknamed the "Cherry Boy" owing to his cheery and upbeat nature.

In his autobiography Breaking Better, released last year, he recalls his turbulent upbringing which he says largely consisted of "uncontrollable rage, failed relationships, sexual, physical abuse and drugs".

He started stealing and by the time he was 11 had been to court five times and at age 12 he was raped and eventually placed into care.

Watch ex-offender Lennox Rodgers share his story of how he turned his life around

"I had been tied to trees and beaten with a belt buckle so severely that I no longer felt the pain," he said.

"It was as if I had emotionally died. I cared for nothing or no one."

In his nominee statement he said: "I was groomed into gang life and organised gangs and used to inflict the most horrid punishments or crimes, with knives and guns.

"The only world I felt able to navigate was behind prison walls over 21 years where I visited 16 different prisons.

"I would force the authorities to impose the harshest possible sentence with one final act of naked savagery."

"Crouched between two commercial refuse bins near London’s Oxford Circus, I was at the end, I wept and couldn’t believe what I had resorted to."

Lennox expected to be put behind bars for the rest of his life yet to his surprise his life would take a different path after serving his sentence.

He said: "Not only did I forsake the criminal gang lifestyle, but I now work tirelessly through workshops and mentoring to prevent vulnerable youngsters being drawn into the same world I had come from."

The former gang leader founded the Refocus project 15-years-ago with his wife Bali Rodgers.

He says not a day goes by where they don't have someone reaching out to break the silence and "get the hell out of gangs, rape – suicidal thoughts and abuse".

The former gang member is now sharing his story as part of the More Than My Past campaign which aims to raise awareness of the potential for ex-offenders and people in recovery from addition to turn their lives around.

Prisons are also now using his story to educate young criminals and many have reached out and asked whether they can talk to Lennox.

The National Diversity Awards is an annual black tie event celebrating the achievements of individuals and organisations across the UK in their fight against inequality.

The event sorts nominees into categories of age, disability, gender, race, faith, religion and sexual orientation.

Winners will be announced at the ceremony on September 25 at the Liverpool Anglican Cathedral.

To find out more about the Refocus Project and the help on offer during the Covid-19 crisis click here.

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