How nationwide red paint attacks signal a Chinese gang feud in Britain

Telegraph

21-04-2025

When Dominic Payne de Cramilly opened a guest house in Colchester 17 years ago he never expected that it would be at the centre of a nationwide crime mystery.
In January, the 2-star hotel was defaced in what initially seemed to be an isolated act of vandalism. But it's now being linked to an ominous cluster of similar incidents whose origins may lie in the Far East.
Police in at least five forces in the UK have been investigating what's become known as the 'red paint attacks', in which the exterior of houses, shops and other businesses have been defaced, often with the word 'brothel' sprawled across them.
There's no sign of an imminent breakthrough, leaving victims unnerved and, frankly, baffled. But officers now believe the attacks could well be the work of rival Chinese crime gangs.
For Payne de Cramilly, it all started with texts from local residents saying that his hotel, the Railway Sleeper Lodge, half-a-mile from Colchester train station, had been damaged by paint.
The 59-year-old, who was at home at the time, jumped in his van and raced to the property. The white, pebbledash walls to the front and side were covered in red and black blotches. A garden wall, the house next door and a car were also spattered with paint, and down the side of the building the word 'brothel' had been scrawled, along with a series of numbers.
'I've been running this place since 2008 and I've never had anything remotely similar,' says Payne de Cramilly, who rents out other houses and flats in the area. 'The worst I ever had was a pot plant smashed off the wall, probably by someone who was drunk.'
His first theory was that the vandals had targeted someone who'd stayed in one of the hotel's self check-in rooms. 'I thought to myself it's either a jilted partner of somebody who's been using my place to hook up with someone… or unbeknown to us, someone's been using it as a place to meet clients.'
Now, however, the Essex landlord believes, as a growing number of experts do, that it's likely to have been part of an organised and, possibly, co-ordinated plot by a crime network to warn, scare off or intimidate adversaries.
Over the past two years, red, and occasionally black, paint has been thrown at three buildings in Liverpool; a cafe, charity shop and two houses in the Reading area; a Thai massage parlour in Huddersfield; two apartment blocks in Bradford and a family home in Clacton-on-Sea.
There have been attacks across London, too, including eight in the borough of Waltham Forest. Walthamstow, an increasingly gentrified and trendy area, might be regarded as an unlikely target but has been hit several times. The local MP, Stella Creasy (Labour and Co-operative), has described the incidents as 'deeply troubling'. She wrote to the Home Office last month to express her concern and demand an investigation.
Many of the properties affected have been daubed with the word 'brothel', just as in Colchester – but it's the use of red paint that has provided the biggest clue as to who the perpetrators may be.
'It's a known mark of Chinese gangs,' says former Metropolitan Police detective David McKelvey, who now runs a private investigation agency, TM Eye. 'What they historically have done is paint opponents' premises red.'
McKelvey says the attacks will escalate only if the groups involved can't reach a deal to settle their differences.
'These are quite clever, organised gangs, they typically sit down and negotiate and work their way through it. It's in no one's interests to get involved in outright gang warfare,' he adds.
Oliver Chan, an associate professor in criminology at the University of Birmingham, says red paint is often used by gangs in southern parts of China and Hong Kong, as well as in neighbouring countries with large Chinese communities, such as Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore.
'Traditionally the use of red colour symbolises anger and impulsion,' Chan says. 'It can serve two primary purposes – to intimidate rival gangs who seem to operate in their territory or turf… and to threaten debtors who are unable to pay up.'
In one of the incidents, CCTV footage obtained by the London Centric newsletter appeared to show the vandals speaking Mandarin with accents from mainland China. 'If this is related to a turf war between two Chinese gangs, it usually begins with intimidation, followed up by negotiation between the higher-ups of both gangs, and if that doesn't go well, a fight can follow,' says Chan.
There's certainly nothing unusual about rivalry between Far Eastern crime groups – and it's been a feature of the underworld in the UK for over a century. In his seminal book, Gangland Britain, crime journalist Tony Thompson said the oldest, and most feared, Chinese gang, the Triads, had tentacles in almost every type of criminal activity, including prostitution, extortion, fraud, money laundering, drugs and illegal immigration (a Chinese gang sometimes linked to the Triads was behind the deaths in June 2000 of 58 people smuggled into Dover in a container lorry) .
According to Thompson, the Triad crime syndicate, most of whose members came from Hong Kong, is made up of a number of smaller gangs. In Britain, in the 1980s and 90s, conflicts between them were commonplace.
In one horrifying incident, three Vietnamese gangsters, who'd originally operated as Triad enforcers, kidnapped two Chinese businessmen, held them captive at a house in south London and threatened them with mutilation and death unless a ransom was paid. In another case, two men thought to be members of the 'most vicious and bloodthirsty' of Triad gangs, the Tai Heun Chai, also known as the Big Circle Gang, were murdered in east London. And in 2010, Manchester's Chinatown was the scene of a full-scale street battle between enemy gangs which left five men in hospital with serious stab wounds. Two years later, a Chinese man was shot dead at a bar in Gerard Street, in London's Chinatown, in an incident believed to have been linked to gang warfare.
It's rare for there to be such violence these days, says Thompson, who now works for the fact-checking site, Full Fact. 'Triads are very good at keeping a low profile. They usually target a very specific community, who are terrified of them.' That's why he's puzzled by the red paint attacks.
'It could be a new gang feeding off those old concerns – some kind of copycat gang using the message from the old days,' he says.
Most of the police investigations seem to be making little progress. The West Yorkshire force said the attacks in Bradford and Huddersfield had been 'closed' because no suspect could be identified. 'There is nothing to suggest they are linked or related to OCGs (organised crime groups),' said a spokesman. Merseyside Police said the red paint incidents in Liverpool were 'isolated' and there were no lines of inquiry to help identify the perpetrators. Thames Valley Police also said there'd been no arrests.
Scotland Yard, however, said it was 'working on the assumption' of a link between the various incidents across the country and was putting a team in place to oversee the investigations in London, which are currently being conducted locally.
It's understood one line of the Met's inquiry is that the cases are related to Chinese organised crime but detectives are keeping an open mind. Like elsewhere, no one has been arrested. McKelvey isn't surprised.
'The Met used to have a squad that was set up purely for Chinese-based crime, but it was disbanded many moons ago and along with it went all the intelligence – there's nothing in place,' says the retired detective chief inspector.
And as resources have become stretched, police have prioritised more serious types of offending. 'Most Chinese-based crime sits below the radar,' he says. 'They're not selling Class A drugs, there's not been much violence, they don't run around with guns, it's economic-based – it's tobacco smuggling, human trafficking, cannabis factories and more recently they've moved into Fentanyl [a synthetic opioid]. It's bumbled along without too much focus,' says McKelvey.
Back in Colchester, Dominic Payne de Camilly is joining the dots. Six days before the Railway Sleeper Lodge was smothered in paint, he got a phone call from a stranger. 'He was speaking with a Chinese accent, saying there was 'illegal activity' in my property – it was very vague and he was tying himself in knots.'
At the time the hotelier thought it was a crank call. Now, he believes it may be connected to the attack, and specifically, the graffiti which spelt out the word 'brothel'. Could it have been a warning that his £60 per night guest house was being used by prostitutes working for a Chinese organised crime gang? Payne de Camilly says he's not aware it was.
He says he provided Essex Police with CCTV of two hooded suspects and details of the phone call, but so far there've been no arrests.
Payne de Camilly lost bookings after guests turned up at the paint-stained hotel and decided to go elsewhere. Now, since the £3,000 damage has been cleared up, it's business as usual – but the attack has left its mark in other ways.
In Colchester, and around the country, there are fears of repeat attacks and mounting concerns that whatever is driving the spate of vandalism doesn't escalate into something even more sinister yet.