A disturbed teenager who murdered three innocent girls in a mass stabbing at a children’s dance class in Southport and later gloated “I’m glad they’re dead” is likely to never be released from prison.
Axel Rudakubana, 18, was sentenced to life with a minimum of 52 years for carrying out the horrific attack which was described as a “pre-meditated attempt to commit indiscriminate mass murder”.
The remorseless killer, who admitted 16 offences, was absent from the dock as his sentence was read out on Thursday, having twice been removed from court for shouting.
He was given 13 life sentences with a minimum term of 51 years and 190 days. Some time was taken off his 52-year sentence due to a period already served in custody.
Judge Mr Justice Goose said he was unable to hand him a rare whole life order because he was only 17 at the time of the attack on 29 July last year. He turned 18 just nine days after the attack.
The teenager dramatically changed his plea on the first day of his trial on Monday, admitting to murdering six-year-old Bebe King, seven-year-old Elsie Dot Stancombe and nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar, who died from her injuries in hospital after she fled the rampage at a Taylor Swift-themed holiday class.
He also pleaded guilty to attempting to murder eight children who were wounded - with some stabbed in the back as they tried to escape - and two adults who tried to protect them.
He further admitted to producing the deadly poison ricin and possessing a document containing al-Qaeda training material, which included information on knife attacks which he used to help plot his assault.
The judge said the killer was intent on “horrific extreme violence” and would have killed all 26 children attending the class and any adult who got in his way if he could.
“In his mind was an intention to murder as many of them as he possibly could,” he said. “He wanted to carry out mass murder on innocent, happy young girls.
“Over 15 minutes, he savagely killed three of them and attempted to kill eight more as well as two adults who tried to stop him.”
The court heard how violence-obsessed Rudakubana had travelled by taxi from his home in Banks, Lancashire, to the Hart Space in Southport, where 26 girls aged six to 13 were attending a fully booked children’s holiday class.
They were making friendship bracelets and singing Taylor Swift songs when he entered the room wearing a surgical face mask and bright green hoodie, brandishing a 20cm kitchen knife.
He grabbed the nearest child and stabbed her before he then moved through the room systematically stabbing as many as possible.
Some were stabbed in the back as they desperately tried to escape, with one girl later seen running out of the building only to be dragged back in by the knifeman.
Members of victims’ families sobbed in the public gallery as harrowing CCTV of the attack was played to the court. In the footage, girls could be seen screaming in terror as they fled the dance studio into the car park.
Shortly afterwards, a seven-year-old girl dressed in summer shorts and a strappy top was shown being pulled back inside the studio by Rudakubana. Later, she was seen stumbling out of the door with visible wounds - clinging to a wall for support before she collapsed on the floor.
When police arrived, officers found Rudakubana at the top of the stairs standing over the body of Bebe holding the kitchen knife, which he dropped when officers told him to.
The scores of injuries he inflicted on Bebe and Elsie were unsurvivable and both died at the scene, prosecutor Deanna Heer KC told the court.
The teenager remained silent in police interview but appeared to gloat about the horrific attack in unsolicited comments made in the police custody suite, which were noted down or recorded on CCTV, saying: “I’m glad those kids are dead, it makes me happy.”
He also said: “I don’t care, I’m feeling neutral,” and “so happy, six years old. It’s a good thing they are dead, yeah.”
Police searches of his address and analysis of his computers uncovered a disturbing fascination with violence, death and genocide – as well as a plastic container of deadly poison ricin.
He had researched car bombs, detonators and nitric acid, and owned weapons including a machete, scabbard and another knife identical to the one used in the attack.
Searches of his devices also revealed an obsession with massacres, torture and a wide range of brutal conflicts, including the genocide in Rwanda, where his parents are from.
Detective chief inspector Jason Pye, the senior investigating officer, said the evidence showed this was “no random acts of violence, but a planned, premeditated attempt to commit indiscriminate mass murder”.
“He wasn’t fighting for a cause,” he said. “His only purpose was to kill and to target the youngest, most vulnerable, no doubt to spread the greatest fear and outrage.”
In a series of harrowing victim impact statements read to the court, class teacher Leanne Lucas, who was stabbed trying to protect the girls, said: “How can I live knowing I survived when children died?
“He targeted us because we were women and girls, vulnerable and easy prey,” she added. “To discover that he had always set out to hurt the vulnerable is beyond comprehensible.”
Alice’s grief-stricken parents, Alexandra and Sergio, sobbed and wiped away tears as the court heard how their lives ended too after she succumbed to her injuries in hospital.
“Once she had lost her fight, we lost our lives,” they said in a statement. “Everything stopped still and we froze in time and space. Our life went with her. He took us too. Six months of continuous pain and a lifetime sentence of it.”
As the court heard from victims about the impact of the crimes, a 14-year-old girl who survived the attack recalled how the “day turned into a living nightmare”.
Reading a statement via video link, she said of Rudakabana: “The thing I remember most about you is your eyes. You didn’t look human, you looked possessed.
“Physically I’ve healed but my scars remain as a reminder of what you did to me, to us all. Give me a reason for what you did. Arming yourself with a weapon and stabbing children.”
Merseyside chief constable Serena Kennedy said the “beautiful faces and names” of the three murder victims “will be etched on the minds of the people of Merseyside forever.”
“The victims were enjoying a day of youthful innocence, untainted by the twisted and unhealthy fascination with violence that drove Axel Rudakubana to carry out the atrocities he had planned in the days leading up to the event,” she added.
“His terrifying attack resulted in the deaths of Bebe, Elsie and Alice – according to prosecution counsel today two of those children suffered particularly horrific injuries which can only be described as sadistic in nature.”
