David Hard, of Beaumont Road, Newton Abbot, writes:
Re: Dust won't settle on troublemakers (letters last week).
I am an 18-year-old skateboarder from Newton Abbot and I was deeply offended to see a letter claiming that us skateboarders and BMXers of Newton Abbot are 'infesting the town with our mayhem', as this claim could not be any further from the truth.
I do not know where these facts are coming from, as not once have any of us forced anyone to move from any benches or even tried smashing them.
It has also been claimed by some that we break the benches by trying to grind on them, which is clearly nonsense. Any person with even the slightest knowledge of skateboarding will inform you it is extremely difficult to do such tricks on wood.
In response to the previous letter I would also like to say that no one alerts us to police activity through our mobile phones. if they ask us to leave, we leave.
The police generally do not mind us skateboarding at the end of town as we do not usually come out until around 6pm, so most shops are closed and means that there will be only a small amount of shoppers left around town. Moreover, we rarely get moved on by the police.
I would, however, like to know about the windows that we smash? this is a new one to me.
Also, it would be much appreciated to be told by these shopkeepers what their opinions of us are, as not once has a shopkeeper moved us on and it makes me wonder whether the author of the previous letter actually took the time to look up any facts or just made up her own to make us look like the monsters she sees us as?
This letter is not trying to imply that we are little angels – as we know we are not – but we are certainly not criminals and we certainly do not crawl out from under stones and infest the town like some form of plague.
This letter is trying to say that we are decent people, simply enjoying a hobby, and if you talk to us, we will talk back like a normal human being.
If anything, having a sport such as skateboarding or BMXing can help to pull some people away from crime, and it is an extremely physically demanding activity.