Axel Rudakubana, who killed three in his attempt to murder 26 young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance party last year will “serve almost the whole of his life in custody”, but not his whole life, because he was days shy of his 18th birthday when he attacked.
Judge Mr Justice Goose handed Rwandan-heritage killer Axel Rudakubana a minimum term of 52 years in prison, saying had he not been 17-year-old when he launched his attack, he would certainly have been handed a rare full life term. This means excepting a successful appeal, Rudakubana will not be liable for parole for 52 years, and even so, in the words of the judge: “he will serve almost the whole of his life in custody. I consider at this time it is likely he will never be released and he will be in custody for all of his life.”
Rudakubana was also sentenced to 18 years for attempting to kill eight further children, and 16 years for attempting to murder two adults who tried to protect the children. On the other counts, he was sentenced to 18 months for possession of a knife, 12 years for producing the biotoxin ricin, and 18 months for possessing a digital copy of an Al-Qaeda training manual.
But these sentences in British law are served “concurrently”, meaning they do not accumulate. The actual sentence is still just 52 years.
Rudakubana was not in court when his sentence was read out as he had repeatedly interrupted proceedings through the day, claiming he hadn’t eaten in ten days and felt unwell. He was removed from the room.
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While a full case was never heard by the court because Rudakubana pleaded guilty at the last minute, nevertheless horrifying new details of the Southport attack have now become public for the first time as they were read out by the prosecution in court, and summarised by Mr Justice Goose in his judgement.
While it had previously been known the victims had been stabbed many times by Rudakubana after he travelled to a children’s holiday fun group, it was revealed today that in at least one case, Rudakubana had worked to decapitate his child victim with a knife.
Summarising, Mr Justice Goose said of the death of seven year old Elsie Dot Stancombe that she suffered “at least 85 sharp force injuries to her head, face, neck, torso, and upper limbs. Severe force was used to cause her death”.
Of the death of six-year-old Bebe King, the judge said Rudakubana “inflicted at least 122 sharp force injuries to her head, face, neck, torso, and upper limbs. It was the opinion of [the pathologist] that Rudakubana had tried to decapitate her. He concluded that severe force was used to kill her”.
Of the death of nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar, Mr Justice Goose said the injuries inflicted by Rudakubana as he murdered her included “a chop wound to her head, and four stab wounds to her back causing substantial internal injury. Although she managed to escape out of the building she collapsed and despite all medical help she died in hospital”. Alice was stabbed with such force in two cases the knife cut through the rib bones themselves.
The Judge said:
…in his mind was the intention to murder as many of them as he physically could. He wanted to try and carry out the mass murder of innocent, happy, young girls and over about 15 minutes he savagely killed three of them and attempted to kill eight more, as well as two adults who tried to stop him.
… Rudakubana has a settled and determined intention to carry out these offences, and had he been able to, he would have killed each and every child, all 26 of them… it is only because some managed to escape that prevented many more from being murdered.
The court was shown security camera footage of the attack which at times was so graphic people sitting in the public gallery left in tears. At one moment, camera covering the outside of the building showed a stream of children fleeing the scene, only for one of them to be grabbed by Rudakubana and pulled back inside to be stabbed.
It was also revealed for the first time that, after his arrest, gloated about the killings. He said in police custody:
I’m glad those kids are dead, it makes me happy. I don’t care, I’m feeling neutral.
…It’s a good thing those children are dead
…Literally, such a good thing those kids are dead, six years old
…I’m so glad the children are dead, so glad. So happy, six years old. It’s a good thing they are dead, yeah.
The court had further heard that Rudakubana had a long-held interest in genocide, had repeatedly carried a knife at school and intended to use it because he believed he’d been subjected to “racist” bullying, and that he had an Al-Qaeda training manual and a potent biotoxin, ricin, at his home. The judge said a former teacher of Rudakubana had described how he was “threatening to those who he felt had wronged him”. Yet without the full trial, exactly why Rudakubana felt young girls had wronged him was never teased out.
One lingering question over the attack is whether it constituted an act of terrorism. The Judge said in his ruling that because the Crown Prosecution Service had decided not to call it terrorism, he couldn’t either, but nevertheless asserted he considered it as serious as terrorism. He told the court:
The prosecution have made it clear that these proceedings were not acts of terrorism within the meaning of the terrorism legislation because there is no evidence that Rudakabana’s purpose was to advance political, religious, racial, or ideological cause. I must accept that conclusion. However in my judgement his culpability for this extreme level of violence is equivalence in its seriousness to terrorist murders, whatever his purpose.
This story is developing, more follows.
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