COUNCILLORS have spoken of their outrage after a man was found with a stab wound to his leg as police attended a report of a group of males with baseball bats in Bradford.

The call was made at 6.49pm on Monday evening, with the man found injured in the Canterbury estate’s Kettlewell Drive.

Bradford District CID recovered a knife from the scene.

The men with baseball bats were believed to have been running from the direction of the Canterbury Youth Centre.

A police cordon was in place until around 11pm on the day while the man was taken to the hospital for further treatment.

Cllr Taj Salam (Labour, Little Horton) said: “This is the first time that we have had an incident of that nature in this area. There has been a number of anti-social behaviour incidents, but violence has not been brought to my attention.

“Violence only breeds violence and people get injured and lose loved ones as we have seen in other parts of the UK. This is something that is absolutely unacceptable on our doorstep.

“People should not resort to violence at all. If there is an issue it should be reported to the relevant authorities and resolved through those channels.

“It is terrible, and it has to be fully investigated by the police and the perpetrators need to be brought to justice.

“We also have to run some educational programs because we don’t want this kind of practice to become frequent.

“Community intelligence is very vital for anything to be tackled. If anybody has got any information on this, I would urge them to come forward and contact the police.”

Cllr Talat Sajawal (Bradford Independent Group, Little Horton) added: “There has been some incidents of knife crime historically but not something that is emerging again. It is totally shocking and unacceptable.

“This is the worry that something like this continues. The hope is that the police crack down on it as a matter of urgency and thoroughly investigate and bring to justice whoever is accountable.”

Meanwhile, Cllr Fareeda Mir (Labour, Little Horton) feels knife crime has forever been a problem in the ward.

She said: “Anything like this that happens in the area is not good and I hope the person who has been injured recovers well and the police are looking into why this happened and hopeful they can get the culprits.

“Knife crime has always been an issue in this area. I think there needs to be some awareness created telling people that knives can seriously injury or kill somebody.”

Bradford District CID are continuing to investigate the incident and have asked for anyone with information that may assist, to contact them on 101 or by using the West Yorkshire Police website. The crime reference is 13210283486.