Hundreds attend vigil after mum, two children, and friend ‘on a sleepover’ found dead
Hundreds of people have attended a vigil in Killamarsh, near Sheffield, to remember a mother and three children who were found dead in the village.
A crowd of around 300, including many children, turned up on Monday evening – a few hundred metres from where Terri Harris, 35, was found dead with her children, John Paul Bennett, 13, and Lacey Bennett, 11, and Lacey’s friend, Connie Gent, also aged 11.
A 31-year-old man from Killamarsh has been arrested and police are not looking for anyone else in connection with the deaths.
Hundreds, some in tears, gathered to listen to a prayer by David Taylor, pastor of Killamarsh Church on the Street
A neighbour said she understood Connie had been at the house in Chandos Crescent for a sleepover.
Some people placed candles, while others brought flowers and teddy bears to lay in tribute.
There were tears as the pastor of Killamarsh Church on the Street, David Taylor, led the attendees in a prayer.
Mr Taylor said: “I’m not enjoying today. It’s a very sad today but it’s absolutely incredible that so many people have joined us tonight.
“What do you say at time like this? It’s so difficult.”
The pastor added: “I can’t give you any answers. I don’t have the answers. But each one of you is here to remember four people who are no longer with us.
“And it is a day that we’ll all remember because this doesn’t happen in Killamarsh. But it has.
“Some of you know the family; some of you know the children; some of you will have never seen them before.
“But you’re all here to show your respect. On behalf of the family I just say, ‘thank you’.”
Some people placed candles, while others brought flowers and teddy bears to lay in tribute
Earlier, John and Lacey’s father Jason Bennett spoke to Sky News as he laid flowers outside the property where the group was found.
“I’m broken, I just want to kiss my babies,” he told Sky’s Becky Johnson. “I just want to kiss them and hold them. TikTok queen and my beautiful boy, they were beautiful. Kindest people you could ever meet.”
Writing on Facebook, Mr Bennett added: “My beautiful boy John and beautiful daughter Lacey have been taken away from me.
“Their mum Terri also lost her life and Lacey’s best friend was also taken away from this world.”
Mr Bennett said he had been making a four-hour journey home when he was told of the deaths, adding that it had “absolutely broken my heart into a million pieces”.
“I didn’t protect my beautiful babies enough from the monsters and now they have been suddenly taken away from me.”
Terri Harris, 35, was found dead alongside her two children and one of their friends. Pic: Facebook
At a news conference on Monday afternoon, Chief Constable Rachel Swann of Derbyshire police said a team of detectives had been “working through the night” to understand what led to the deaths.
In a statement, Derbyshire Constabulary said they were called to the home in Killamarsh at around 7.25am on Sunday following concerns about a man in the area.
The 31-year-old remains in custody. Officers did not have any prior contact with those involved, police added.
Derbyshire Constabulary said they were called to the home near Sheffield at around 7.25am on Sunday
Mr Bennett’s parents Debbie and Trevor Bennett also visited the scene of the incident on Monday.
Mrs Bennett said both children loved football – Lacey was a “proper” girl and John enjoyed his computers.
She added: “I don’t know how he’ll [Jason] come through this. He’s going to need a lot of strength.”
UK
Home secretary admits illegal immigration numbers still ‘too high’ under Labour – but says Farage can ‘sod off’
The home secretary has admitted the UK’s illegal immigrant numbers are “too high” – but said Nigel Farage can “sod off” after he claimed she sounded like a Reform supporter.
Shabana Mahmood, speaking just after announcing a major policy change on migration, said she was “horrified” by the 27% increase of irregular arrivals in the year to June.
Politics latest: Labour MPs attack asylum plans
Speaking to Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby, the home secretary said: “I acknowledge the numbers are too high, and they’ve gone up, and I want to bring them down.
“I’m impatient to bring those numbers down.”
She refused to “set arbitrary numbers” on how much she wanted to bring illegal migration down to.
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Beth Rigby: The two big problems with Labour’s asylum plan
Earlier on Monday, Ms Mahmood announced a new direction in Labour’s plan to crack down on asylum seekers.
The “restoring order and control” plan includes:
• The removal of more families with children – either voluntarily through cash incentives up to £3,000, or by force;
• Quadrupling the time successful asylum seekers must wait to claim permanent residency in the UK, from five years to 20;
• Removing the legal obligation to provide financial support to asylum seekers, so those with the right to work but choose not to will receive no support;
• Setting up a new appeals body to significantly speed up the time it takes to decide whether to refuse an asylum application;
• Reforming how the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) is interpreted in immigration cases;
• Banning visas for countries refusing to accept deportees;
• And the establishment of new safe and legal refugee routes.
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Home secretary announces details on asylum reform
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage said the plan was much like something his party would put forward, and said Ms Mahmood sounded like a Reform supporter.
The home secretary responded with her usual frankness, telling Rigby: “Nigel Farage can sod off. I’m not interested in anything he’s got to say.
“He’s making mischief. So I’m not going to let him live forever in my head.”
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Nigel Farage said the home secretary was sounding like a Reform supporter
She earlier announced refugee status would be temporary, only lasting two and a half years before a review, and they would have to be in the UK for 20 years before getting permanent settled status, instead of the current five years.
Ms Mahmood said Reform wanted to “rip up” indefinite leave to remain altogether, which she called “immoral” and “deeply shameful”.
The home secretary, who is a practising Muslim, was born in Birmingham to her Pakistani parents.
Earlier, in the House of Commons, she said she sees the division that migration and the asylum system are creating across the country. She told MPs she regularly endures racial slurs.
BBC chair Samir Shah has said there is “no basis for a defamation case and we are determined to fight this” – after Donald Trump said he would sue the corporation for between $1bn and $5bn.
It comes after the US president confirmed on Saturday he would be taking legal action against the broadcaster over the editing of his speech on Panorama – despite an apology from the BBC.
Samir Shah said the BBC’s position ‘has not changed’. Pic: Reuters
In an email to staff, Mr Shah said: “There is a lot being written, said and speculated upon about the possibility of legal action, including potential costs or settlements.
“In all this we are, of course, acutely aware of the privilege of our funding and the need to protect our licence fee payers, the British public.
“I want to be very clear with you – our position has not changed. There is no basis for a defamation case and we are determined to fight this.”
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On Saturday, President Trump told reporters legal action would come in the following days.
“We’ll sue them. We’ll sue them for anywhere between a billion (£792m) and five billion dollars (£3.79bn), probably sometime next week,” he said.
“We have to do it, they’ve even admitted that they cheated. Not that they couldn’t have not done that. They cheated. They changed the words coming out of my mouth.”
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The BBC on Thursday said the edit of Mr Trump’s speech on 6 January 2021 had given the “mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action”.
The broadcaster apologised and said the splicing of the speech was an “error of judgment” but refused to pay financial compensation after the US leader’s lawyers threatened to sue for one billion dollars in damages unless a retraction and apology were published.
Deborah Turness. Pic: Reuters
Tim Davie. Pic: PA
The Panorama scandal prompted the resignations of two of the BBC’s most senior executives – director-general Tim Davie and news chief Deborah Turness.
The broadcaster has said it will not air the Panorama episode Trump: A Second Chance? again, and published a retraction on the show’s webpage on Thursday.
A British man who hacked the X accounts of celebrities in a bid to con people out of Bitcoin, has been ordered to repay £4.1m-worth of the cryptocurrency, prosecutors say.
Joseph James O’Connor, 26, was jailed in the United States for five years in 2023 after he pleaded guilty to charges including computer intrusion, wire fraud and extortion.
He was arrested in Spain in 2021 and extradited after the country’s high court ruled the US was best placed to prosecute because the evidence and victims were there.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said on Monday it had obtained a civil recovery order to seize 42 Bitcoin and other crypto assets linked to the scam, in which O’Connor used hijacked accounts to solicit digital currency and threaten celebrities.
The July 2020 hack compromised accounts of high-profile figures including former US presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
O’Connor and his co-conspirators stole more than $794,000 (£629,000) of cryptocurrency after using the hacked accounts to ask people to send $1,000 in Bitcoin to receive double back.
Prosecutor Adrian Foster said the civil recovery order showed that “even when someone is not convicted in the UK, we are still able to ensure they do not benefit from their criminality”.
The order, which valued O’Connor’s assets at around £4.1m, was made last week, following a freeze placed on the hacker’s property, which prosecutors secured during extradition proceedings.
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A court-appointed trustee will liquidate his assets, the CPS said.
The attack also compromised the X (then Twitter) accounts of other high-profile figures including Tesla chief executive Elon Musk, investor Warren Buffett, and media personality and businesswoman Kim Kardashian.
The hack prompted the social media platform to temporarily freeze some accounts.
X said 130 accounts were targeted, with 45 used to send tweets.
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