Olivia Pratt-Korbel: Reformed Liverpool gangster says ‘morals have gone out of the window’ among city’s criminals
Sicarius McGrath is a big guy. Muscled, shaven-headed and more than a little intimidating – everything you might expect of a Liverpool gangster.
But his days of roaming the streets of Anfield are over and now he helps steer vulnerable and deprived kids away from a life of gangland crime.
With convictions for violence and intimidation, he knows his subject and was an enlightening companion as together we toured the city’s estates, waiting for the jury verdicts in the Olivia Pratt-Korbel murder trial.
I drove, he talked. When he was setting up a gun factory and protection rackets he was known as Anthony Harrington.
At 7pm Sky News will broadcast a special programme: The murder of Olivia Pratt-Korbel
Sicarius McGrath says he used to ‘put guns on the streets in massive volumes’
His adopted name Sicarius means “assassin”, but he didn’t go to a school that taught Latin. I did, but that isn’t the only difference between us.
“I used to put guns on the streets in massive volumes,” he told me, rather matter-of-factly.
“They are bought and paid for through drugs money. I felt responsibility 100% for the things that happened, whether someone was harmed as a result, but when you’re in that game you don’t give a s***. It’s profits over anything else.
“Decades ago there was a moral code, that you didn’t harm women, you didn’t harm kids. I’m not saying that little girl was shot intentionally, but those morals have gone out of the window.
“I was mixing in those circles and surroundings, so I’m a bit of a hypocrite to say now they are absolute scum, but I was once that scumbag.”
Read more: Thomas Cashman found guilty of murdering Olivia Pratt-Korbel
Olivia Pratt-Korbel was shot dead in her home
Although Merseyside Police had a key witness within a day or two of Olivia’s shooting, they struggled to find the direct evidence detectives always strive for.
There were no forensics, no eyewitnesses who could identify the killer and the two guns used have not been found.
I asked Mr McGrath how a close community deals with the conflict of outrage and the need for justice, set against loyalty and the fear of being labelled a grass.
“People are going to be reluctant, of course they are, depending on who commits the murder. If it’s established gang members people are going to be more reluctant. Everyone says there’s a code, no grassing, but criminals will grass each other up,” he said.
“It’s a question of what benefits them, if they can get a rival out of the way, bring police attention on them, but they’re not just gonna do it for charity.”
Gasps as Thomas Cashman found guilty on all charges – follow updates
What about the ordinary public – wouldn’t they be more scared of retribution for giving police information?
“It’s gonna be scary, they’re not really going to want to get involved, but when it’s a little girl the rule book goes out the window and you have to dig deep,” he said.
“People are more likely to engage with the police when it’s a young girl murdered and it’s up to the police to reassure them they are going to protect them.”
A month on from the shooting, after initial arrests but no charges, and with police still appealing for help, an anonymous businessman offered a remarkable £100,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of Olivia’s killer.
Lord Ashcroft, the founder of Crimestoppers, had also initially offered a £50,000 reward – but the anonymous donation prompted him to double his offer and, at £200,000 combined, it became the biggest ever reward.
At 7pm Sky News will broadcast a special programme: The murder of Olivia Pratt-Korbel
Olivia’s coffin carried by horse-drawn carriage on the day of her funeral. Pic: AP
The other businessman, who did not want to be named for safety reasons, said: “When I heard that there was a seeming reluctance for people to come forward and testify, that’s what really got my back up.
“I thought, well, I’m going to try and do something about this. It was an amount that would make people sit up and make it as easy as possible for them to help catch the killer.”
The businessman’s family are from Merseyside and memories of his childhood in the area fuelled his desire for justice for Olivia.
“I understand people’s reluctance to speak out and I’ve thought about my own safety in putting up the reward. Like others, I had doubts and worries, but Crimestoppers assured me my identity would be protected. The bottom line is that this was horrific, the murder of a young girl. It doesn’t come much worse than that.”
Read more from Sky News:
Who are Liverpool’s feuding gangs?
Merseyside beset by violence in summer trail of bloodshed
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
The battle between Liverpool’s gangs
Mick Duthie, director of operations at Crimestoppers, said the reward had prompted “a phenomenal amount” of information from the public.
“I understand that in communities people don’t want to be seen as a grass or make themselves vulnerable, they don’t want to talk to the police, so the charity allows people to speak up anonymously,” he said.
“The community of Liverpool provided so much information. It wasn’t for us to decide how important it was. We took it and passed it on to Merseyside Police.”
As we drove through Dovecot, where Olivia was murdered, I asked Mr McGrath whether £200,000 was a life-changing amount for people in this community.
“For someone anywhere in the country it’s a life-changing amount of money,” he said.
“People are struggling to put their lights on and run their cookers. A reward of £200,000 is gonna benefit the vast majority of people, criminals and non-criminals.”
Sixteen years ago, schoolboy Rhys Jones, who was 11, was shot dead – caught in cross-fire – only a few miles from here.
I reported on it at the time and Mr McGrath was in prison, but we both remember the loud and widespread calls for change.
Rhys Jones was shot dead after being caught in cross-fire close to his home
Mr McGrath said: “They always say that when a young person is stabbed or shot, they always say enough is enough, they’re going to take a stand but communities never do. It’s all just words.
“A couple of days or weeks later they go back to doing what they were doing. It’s only the families that are left suffering. Whoever shot Olivia, whoever’s convicted, his friends won’t stop talking to him because he shot a young girl.”
A blitz on organised crime and guns by Merseyside Police has driven down the number of firearms discharges to record low levels in the past couple of years.
There hadn’t been one reported in more than a year before last August. But then Olivia became the third gun murder victim in just a week. And there have been two more in the city since.
Schoolchildren are asking teachers how to strangle a partner during sex safely, a charity says, while official figures show an alarming rise in the crime related to domestic abuse cases.
Warning: This article contains references to strangulation, domestic abuse and distressing images.
It comes as a woman whose former partner almost strangled her to death in a rage has advised anyone in an abusive relationship to seek help.
Bernie Ryan, chief executive of the Institute for Addressing Strangulation, has been running the charity since its inception in 2022 after non-fatal strangulation became a standalone offence.
“It’s the ultimate form of control,” she says.
She says perpetrators and victims are getting younger, while the reason is unclear, but strangulation has seeped into popular culture and social media.
“We hear lots of sex education providers, teachers saying that they’re hearing it in schools.
“We know teachers have been asked, ‘how do I teach somebody to strangle safely?’
“Our message is there is no safe way to strangle – the anatomy is the anatomy. Reduction in oxygen to the brain or blood flow will result in the same medical consequences, regardless of context.”
Bernie Ryan, CEO of the Institute for Addressing Strangulation
A recent review by Conservative peer Baroness Gabby Bertin recommended banning “degrading, violent and misogynistic content” online.
Violent pornography showing women being choked during sex she found was “rife on mainstream platforms”.
Ms Ryan says she “wants to make sure that young people don’t have access to activities that demonstrate that this is normal behaviour”.
Read more from Sky News:
Suspect accused of Derby bank murder appears in court
Man whose body was found in suitcase ‘had raped teenager’
Strangulation is a violent act that is often committed in abusive relationships.
It is the second most common method used by men to kill women, the first is stabbing.
According to statistics shared by the Crown Prosecution Service, in 2024 there was an almost 50% rise in incidents of non-fatal strangulation and suffocation – compared to the year before.
Kerry Allan pleads for other victims of abuse to seek help
Domestic abuse victim Kerry Allan has a message for anyone who is in an abusive relationship.
Kerry met Michael Cosgrove in September 2022. While she said “at the beginning it was really good”, within months he became physically abusive.
In August last year her friends found his profile on a dating app.
“I confronted him and he denied it. I knew we were going to get into a big argument and I couldn’t face it, so I said I was going to my mum’s for a few days and take myself away from the situation.
“I came back a few days later and stupidly I agreed we could try again and everything escalated from that.”
Injuries to Kerry’s chest. Pic: CPS
In the early hours of 25 August the pair had come in from a night out at a concert and got into an argument.
“He was having a go at me, accusing me of flirting with other people, and I was angry. I told him he had a nerve after what he’d done to me in the week and how he humiliated me.
“I told him that I wanted to leave, that we were done and that I wanted to go to my mum’s and that’s when it got bad.
“He pinned me to the bed and that’s when he first strangled me.”
Kerry’s neck injury. Pic: CPS
Kerry says this was the first time she’d ever been violently assaulted. Cosgrove was eerily silent as he eventually let go and Kerry gasped for air.
“I remember trying to get my breath back, I was crying and hyperventilating… I was sick on the bedroom floor and I was asking him to go.”
Cosgrove strangled her for a second time before letting go again.
“He was saying I wasn’t getting out of this bedroom alive. I was dead tonight, he hoped that I knew that. Just kept saying how I’d ruined his life.”
Injury to Kerry’s eye. Pic: CPS
“I remember feeling a sort of shock thinking at this point, I’m not going to get out of this bedroom, he’s actually going to kill me.”
Kerry began screaming and shouting for help as loud as she could.
Her neighbours heard the commotion and called the police. While they were en route, Kerry was once again being assaulted.
Bleeding in Kerry’s eye
“I ran over to the bedroom window and tried to jump out, he grabbed me as I went to open the window, and we struggled. And then I was back in the same position, he was on top of me on the bed, and his hands were round the throat again. But this time it didn’t stop.
“I remember trying to struggle and trying to kick out and hit him and I just kept thinking that I definitely was going to die, because at this point, it wasn’t stopping.”
The next memory Kerry has is opening her eyes to see police and paramedics in the bedroom.
Michael Cosgrove. Pic: CPS
Cosgrove had heard the sirens, jumped out of the bedroom window and went to hide in Kerry’s car.
Kerry remembers opening her eyes to paramedics caring for her: “I remember thinking, I’m alive. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe that I was alive and I wasn’t dead. My last memory is him being on top of me with his hands on my throat.”
Kerry met Michael Cosgrove in September 2022
She gives this advice to anyone who is in an abusive relationship: “Please speak to somebody, whether it’s friends, family, a work colleague, whether it’s somebody online, whether it’s a charity that you’re directed to, any sort of abuse is not okay.
“Whether it starts off emotional, they often start off that way, and they escalate, and they can escalate badly.
“Take what happened to me as a huge warning sign, because I wouldn’t want anyone else to be in the position I’ve been in the last eight months.”
Cosgrove was found guilty of attempting to murder Kerry and intentional strangulation.
He will be sentenced in July.
If you suspect you are being abused and need to speak to someone, there are people who can help you.
The National Domestic Violence Helpline: 0808 2000 247
Respect, the helpline for male domestic abuse victims: 0808 8010327
Galop, the LGBT+ anti-violence charity: 0800 999 5428
Two men have been found guilty of cutting down the famous Sycamore Gap tree that stood for more than 150 years.
Daniel Graham and Adam Carruthers were convicted of causing more than £620,000 worth of damage to the tree and more than £1,000 worth of damage to Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland.
On 27 September 2023, the pair drove 30 miles through a storm to Northumberland from Cumbria, where they both lived, before felling the tree overnight in a matter of minutes.
The Sycamore Gap tree before it was cut down. Pic: CPS
The pair each denied two counts of criminal damage to the sycamore and to Hadrian’s Wall, which was damaged when the tree fell on it, but were convicted by a jury at Newcastle Crown Court on Friday.
The Sycamore Gap tree sat in a dip in the landscape and held a place in pop culture, featuring in the 1991 Kevin Costner film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.
It also formed part of people’s personal lives, as the scene of wedding proposals, ashes being scattered and countless photographs.
Footage of the moment the tree was felled was played during the trial.
Daniel Graham. Pic: Northumbria Police/PA
Adam Carruthers. Pic: Northumbria Police/PA
In the clip, the sound of a chainsaw can be heard, and the silhouette of a person can be seen, before the trunk eventually tumbled.
The footage was shot on Graham’s iPhone 13, with the metadata providing the coordinates of the tree.
Part of tree kept as ‘trophy’
Over the course of the trial, the pair blamed one another, but the prosecution argued they were both responsible for what the court heard was a “mindless act of vandalism”.
As well as the video footage of the felling, an image of a piece of wood and a chainsaw was found on Graham’s phone.
Adam Carruthers (R) and Daniel Graham (L) worked together felling trees. Pic: CPS/PA
An image of a piece of wood and a chainsaw was found on Graham’s phone. Pic: PA
Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, told the court: “This was perhaps a trophy taken from the scene to remind them of their actions, actions that they appear to have been revelling in.”
Voice notes played in court
The jury was also played voice notes the pair had sent one another, commenting on the media coverage the incident was receiving.
In one of them, Graham, 39, said to 32-year-old Carruthers: “Someone there has tagged like ITV News, BBC News, Sky News, like News News News”, before adding: “I think it’s going to go wild.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Sycamore Gap seeds saved
Another piece of evidence was a photo of the defendants felling a different tree, about a month before the Sycamore Gap was cut down.
The prosecution said Graham, who owned a groundworks company and Carruthers, who worked in property management and mechanics, were “friends with knowledge and experience in chainsaws and tree felling”.
From the beginning, much of the trial focused on the significance of the tree, with Judge Mrs Justice Lambert telling the jury to put their “emotion to one side” before proceedings began.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Voicenotes from Sycamore Gap tree trial
‘Mindless acts of violence’
Northumberland Superintendent Kevin Waring, of Northumbria Police, said: “We often hear references made to mindless acts of vandalism – but that term has never been more relevant than today in describing the actions of those individuals”.
Graham and Carruthers gave no explanation for why they targeted the tree, he said, “and there never could be a justifiable one”.
Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner, Susan Dungworth, called the felling of the tree “unfathomable” and said, although “there was no remorse [from the defendants], there was compelling evidence, and now there will be justice”.
Gale Gilchrist, chief crown prosecutor for CPS North East, said Graham and Carruthers took “under three minutes” to bring down the “iconic landmark” in a “deliberate and mindless act of destruction”.
She said she hoped the community “can take some measure of comfort in seeing those responsible convicted”.
‘Enormity of the loss’
Reflecting on the verdict and the actions of the pair, Tony Gates, chief executive of Northumberland National Parks Authority, said: “It just took a few days to sink in – I think because of the enormity of the loss.
“We knew how important that location was for many people at an emotional level, almost at a spiritual level in terms of people’s connection to this case.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Moment Sycamore Gap tree cut down
Read more from the trial:
Two men went on ‘moronic mission’ to fell Sycamore Gap tree
Man told police he was being ‘framed’ over tree felling
Defendant says friend wanted to cut down world’s ‘most famous tree’
Jurors played voicenotes in Sycamore Gap tree trial
The tree’s stump still sits by Hadrian’s Wall, where new shoots have been emerging.
Its largest remaining section will go on display at the National Landscape Discovery Centre in the Northumberland National Park later this year.
The effort to preserve the tree’s legacy also goes beyond the region where it stood.
Forty-nine saplings taken from the tree have been conserved by the National Trust. They will be planted in accessible public spaces across the country as “trees of hope”, which will allow parts of the Sycamore Gap to live on.
The defendants, who didn’t react when the verdicts were delivered, will be sentenced in July.
UK
Ochuko Ojiri: Bargain Hunt art expert pleads guilty following police investigation into terrorist financing
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business3 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway