A UK judge on Thursday sentenced a confessed child killer to life in prison for brutally murdering three girls in a series of stabbings last year that sparked the worst unrest in the country in more than a decade, as families mourned in the court before the horrific details of the “extreme violence” he inflicted on them.
Sentencing violence-obsessed Axel Rudakubana to 13 life sentences for the three murders and 10 attempted murders, Judge Julian Goose said he believed it was “very likely that he will never be released”, and ordered that he serve a minimum of 52 years .
“The damage Rudakubana has caused to every family, every child and community has been profound and permanent,” the judge told Liverpool Crown Court in northwest England.
The judge said Rudakubana’s aim in his 15-minute spree had been the “mass murder of innocent and happy young people”.
If he had not been stopped, “he would have killed every single one of the children, all 26 of them, as well as any adult who stood in his way,” he said.
“The only thing that stopped him from continuing to murder was the escape of other children.”
After some of the injured girls escaped, Rudakubana “returned to continue his sustained and brutal violence against two of the younger children, stabbing them several times,” the judge added.
Sobs and gasps were heard in court as prosecutor Deanna Heer laid out details of the rampage at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class last July in Southport, northwest England.
Rudakubana, then 17, was heard saying, “I’m glad they’re dead,” after he was arrested, Heer told the court.
She described how she burst into the spa studio where a group of young girls were sitting on the floor making bracelets, listening to Swift’s hit songs.
After his arrest, police found violent content on Rudakubana’s devices, including images of dead bodies, torture victims, beheadings, cartoons depicting murder, violence and rape or that insulted or mocked different religions.
On the day of the murders, Heer said, Rudakubana searched online for information about a stabbing at a Sydney church earlier in the year.
He then headed to the location of the dance class in a taxi armed with a 20-centimeter-long kitchen knife.
“Within 30 seconds, screams can be heard coming from inside, followed by children fleeing the building,” Heer said.
Rudakubana, 18, pleaded guilty earlier this week to the murders of Bebe King, six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, as well as 10 counts of attempted murder and possession of a knife. at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, northwest England. King was stabbed 122 times, the judge revealed.
He also admitted to producing a biological toxin, ricin, as well as possessing an Al-Qaeda training manual. His guilty plea Monday halted his impending trial.
“The girl of our dreams was taken from us in such a horrible and undignified manner that it destroyed our souls,” Aguiar’s parents said in a statement to the court.
Stancombe’s mother called her daughter’s killer “cruel and evil” and said his actions were those of “a coward.”
The judge twice ordered Rudakubana to leave court after repeatedly shouting that he felt unwell. He was not present in court to hear the sentence, as he refused to return.
Rudakubana’s multiple court appearances to date have been marked by his uncooperative behavior: The defendant repeatedly refused to speak and refused to appear in court on Monday, where he muttered “guilty” to each of the charges.
The teenager’s attack last July shocked the United Kingdom, sparking anti-immigrant riots in more than a dozen English and northern Irish towns and cities, amid viral misinformation that a Muslim asylum seeker was responsible.
In fact, Rudakubana was born in Cardiff to parents of Rwandan origin and lived in Banks, a village northeast of Southport.
His Christian parents, both of church-going Tutsi ethnicity, came to Britain in the years after the 1994 Rwandan genocide, according to UK media. Their church has said they are now hiding for their protection.
The attack has not been treated as a terrorist incident and he was never charged with terrorism offences, prompting criticism from some.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer told the families of the three girls that “we are with you in your grief” after today’s sentencing.
Starmer added that Rudakubana had been responsible for “one of the most heartbreaking moments in our country’s history.”
On Tuesday he had promised to update terrorism legislation “if the law needs to be changed,” to recognize what he called the new threat of individuals determined to exercise “extreme violence, apparently for its own sake.”
Meanwhile, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced that a public inquiry would look into how police, courts and social care services “failed to identify the terrible risk and danger he posed to others”.
living nightmare
Heer said that on July 29, dance teacher Heidi Liddle was sitting on the floor helping to make bracelets when she saw Rudakubana walk in and start “attacking the children.”
He started to push them towards the exit, but after one of the girls ran into the bathroom, he followed her and closed the door.
“Outside you heard the children screaming and then the door rang. When he heard voices outside the door asking the accused to stop, he realized that not all the children had managed to escape,” Heer said, adding that some were stabbed in the back while fleeing.
Some relatives in the public gallery were crying. Others sat with their heads in their hands and wiped their eyes as harsh security camera footage showed frightened and screaming children fleeing the scene.
In victim impact statements read to the court, a 14-year-old survivor who was stabbed in the arm said the day became a “living nightmare”.
“What I remember most about you (Rudakubana) are your eyes. “You didn’t look human, you looked possessed,” he said.
Class instructor Leanne Lucas, 36, who was also injured, said that since the attack she could no longer be home alone, go to work or walk down the street.
“The impact this has had on me can be summed up in one word: trauma,” he said.
“He attacked us because we were women and girls, vulnerable and easy prey,” she added.
Failures
Bebe King, six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, died in the attack at the seaside resort near Liverpool on July 29, 2024.
Ten other people were injured, including eight children, in one of the country’s worst mass stabbings in decades.
Unrest related to the murders lasted almost a week.
Rioters attacked police, shops and hotels housing asylum seekers, as well as mosques, and hundreds of people were arrested and charged at the time and over the following months.
Authorities blamed far-right agitators for fueling the violence, including by sharing misinformation about the attacker.
Following Monday’s guilty plea and the lifting of restrictions on reporting in court, new information about Rudakubana emerged.
He had been referred three times to the government’s national anti-extremism scheme, Prevent, over concerns about his obsession with violence.
Prevent aims to “prevent people from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism” or help rehabilitate those already involved in terrorism, according to the Home Office.
He had also been excluded from school, and reports suggested that when he was 13 he was bullied and began carrying a knife.
Social workers reportedly required a police escort when they visited him at the family home due to the perception that he posed a threat.
Reports also said authorities had long known of his interest in mass atrocities and murders after they found him researching a school computer.
Starmer called the apparent decision that Rudakubana did not meet the threshold for Prevent intervention “clearly wrong”.
Meanwhile, Cooper has promised stricter measures to tackle online knife sales, calling it “a total disgrace” that Rudakubana was able to buy one on Amazon despite being 17 and having a conviction.
