Southport murderer Axel Rudakubana has been jailed for a minimum of 52 years – with the judge saying it’s “highly likely” he will never be released.

Warning: This article contains details of violence that some readers might find distressing.

The 18-year-old pleaded guilty to murdering Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class.

Southport murders latest – Killer likely to never be freed

Rudakubana also admitted trying to murder eight other children, as well as instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes, on 29 July last year.

The judge, Mr Justice Goose, gave him 13 life sentences and said if Rudakubana had been 18 at the time of the attack he would have received a whole-life term – meaning no possibility of release.

He said the killings had caused “shock and revulsion” to the nation and Rudakubana would have killed all 26 children if he’d been able.

Alice, Bebe and Elsie were stabbed multiple times in a ferocious attack that lasted 15 minutes.

Prosecutors told the court that, while in custody, the 18-year-old said: “It’s a good thing those children are dead, I’m so glad, I’m so happy.”

Rudakubana’s attack on “innocent, happy young girls” was clearly premeditated and he had showed no remorse, the judge added.

He will be 70 before a parole board can consider releasing him, but the judge said it was “highly likely” he will never be freed.

The triple-killer was sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court, but was not present for the judge’s remarks after telling his lawyer he would be “disruptive” during proceedings.

During sentencing earlier in the day he was twice ordered out of the dock after shouting that he “felt ill”.

Rudakubana told his lawyer he had chest pains, was too ill to continue and wanted to see a paramedic, but the judge said two paramedics had deemed him fit to continue.

‘How can I live knowing children died?’

Before sentencing, the court heard emotional statements from victims and families.

Alice’s family – who had been planning to surprise her with a trip to Disneyland – said she was “strong and confident” with “unlimited potential”. They said her death had “shattered our souls”.

Elsie’s mum said Rudakubana was a coward and “beyond contempt”.

“He took our daughter. There’s no greater loss and no greater pain. He has left us with a lifetime of grief,” she said.

Dance teacher Leanne Lucas, who was stabbed in the back, said she couldn’t give herself “compassion or accept praise, as how can I live knowing I survived when children died?”.

Killer pulled girl back inside

Rudakubana was 17 when he walked into the dance studio before silently, indiscriminately stabbing his victims with a kitchen knife – a 20cm blade he had bought on Amazon using encrypted software to hide his identity.

He stabbed some of his victims in the back as they tried to escape, pulling one girl back inside to attack her – she was knifed dozens of times but survived.

Police arrested Rudakubana inside the Hart Space venue as he stood over a body, still holding the knife.

Officers later found a plastic kitchen box containing the toxin ricin under his bed in the village of Banks, Lancashire, along with other weapons including a machete and arrows.

An analysis of his devices revealed an obsession with violence, war and genocide, with documents discovered including an academic study of an al Qaeda training manual.

Police believe he used techniques he learned from the PDF file, which contained instructions on how to commit knife and ricin attacks, to carry out the mass stabbing.

Read more:
The 14 minutes of terror that left three children dead
Family of Rudakubana ‘moved to secret location’
No wonder public is confused about attack – analysis

‘Cowardly and vicious’

The 18-year-old pleaded guilty to charges of producing ricin and possession of information useful for the purposes of terrorism.

The judge said it was highly likely he would have used the potent toxin if he hadn’t carried out the stabbing attack.

Merseyside police chief Serena Kennedy said there was no evidence Rudakubana ascribed to any political or religious ideology and was not fighting for a cause, so the “cowardly and vicious attack” was not treated as terrorism.

“This is a young man with an unhealthy obsession with violence,” she said.

“His only purpose was to kill the youngest and most vulnerable and spread the greatest level of fear and outrage, which he succeeded in doing.”

The attack sparked the UK riots last summer after false claims online that Rudakubana – born in Cardiff to Christian parents from Rwanda – was a newly arrived asylum seeker.

Missed opportunities

The government has announced an inquiry into how the state failed to recognise the risk posed by Rudakubana and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has said he will consider changing the definition of terrorism if necessary.

The teenager was referred three times by schools to the government’s anti-extremism programme between 2019 and 2021 over concerns about his interest in school shootings, Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, and the London Bridge attacks.

He also had repeated contact with police, the courts, the justice system and mental health services in the years before he carried out the attack, including over using school computers to research acts of violence.

Rudakubana was expelled from school for saying he was carrying a knife in October 2019, but returned to attack another pupil with a hockey stick, while carrying a knife in his backpack.

He pleaded guilty to assault, possession of an offensive weapon, and possession of a knife over the incident and received a youth justice referral order focused on knife crime.

His parents called police four times about his behaviour, including on one occasion in May 2022 after they restricted his access to a computer.

On another occasion in March of the same year, a bus driver called the police because he had not paid the fare, and he told officers he had a knife, but they took him home to talk to his mother about securing knives at home.

No disciplinary proceedings have been brought against anyone involved in dealing with his case.

Axel Rudakubana’s horrific knife attack on a Taylor Swift-themed holiday club killed three children and injured others. This is how it unfolded.

By Natasha Muktarsingh, assistant editor, and Henry Vaughan, home affairs reporter

Thursday 23 January 2025 18:43, UK

Why you can trust Sky News

Warning: This article contains graphic references to violence

When yoga instructor Leanne Lucas posted an advert for a Taylor Swift-themed holiday club in Southport, the two-hour dance class sold out within 11 days.

It was a beautiful summer’s morning on 29 July when 26 children, all girls aged between six and 13, were dropped off by their parents to dance, play and make friendship bracelets.

Meanwhile, at his family home in the nearby village of Banks, Lancashire, Axel Rudakubana, then 17, armed himself with a 20cm kitchen knife he had earlier bought on Amazon.

This is a timeline of what happened next:

Follow latest: Dance class killer Axel Rudakubana sentenced

10am: The workshop led by Leanne and her colleague Heidi Liddle gets under way.

11.04am: Rudakubana searches online for “Mar Mari Emmanuel stabbing” – the knife attack on a bishop in Sydney, Australia, earlier that year.

11.10am: Despite the sunshine, he is wearing a green hoodie with the hood up and a surgical face mask covering his face when he leaves his home in the village of Banks in Lancashire.

11.11am: One minute later, he is captured on CCTV at a bus stop making a call to book a taxi.

11.16am: Around five minutes later he heads back towards home.

11.30am: Rudakubana is picked up and travels in silence for the 4.5-mile journey to Hart Street in Southport.

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11.43am: When he arrives, he asks the driver to direct him to 34a. But he refuses to pay the driver, who then follows him down a driveway towards Masters Vehicle Body Repairs at number 36a.

Read more:
What are the UK’s knife crime laws?
Southport attacker had ‘kill list’

11.44am: Rudakubana retreats after the owner of the car repair workshop, Colin Parry, and his colleague confront him, telling him to pay the fare but Rudakubana replies: “What are you going to do about it?”

Inside the dance studio, on the first floor of an industrial unit down a path off the main road, children are gathered around tables making bracelets, while a life-size model of Taylor Swift stands nearby for the youngsters to pose for photos with.

As Ms Lucas opens a window because of the hot weather she sees the teenager outside but thinks nothing of it.

11.45am: Rudakubana walks into the 34a Hart Street building, climbs up the stairs to the first floor and opens the door armed with the black-handled kitchen knife.

Without saying a word, he grabs the girl nearest to him and begins stabbing her, before moving through the room, stabbing as many children as he can.

11.46am: CCTV shows one child as she tries to escape the building but is dragged back in by Rudakubana, before she staggers out and collapses.

11.47am: Merseyside Police receive their first emergency call.

11.48-11.56am: North West Ambulance Service respond after a call reporting the stabbings.

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Window cleaner, Joel Verite, then 25, is driving past with his work partner. They stop to help Leanne Lucas who has been stabbed in the back before fleeing the building with several children. She tells them children are being attacked.

Mr Verite runs down the driveway to the dance studio where a mother waiting to collect her daughter has parked. She has her daughter in the car and three other girls who have managed to escape.

She asks him to help a child who has been stabbed several times. He later described opening the door behind the driver’s seat to find the girl “had many holes in her body”.

Mr Verite carries the child back to the street, where other members of the public are gathering to help. Then he runs to the building’s entrance, where he is told by two men the attacker is in the dance studio.

Mr Verite sees a man at the top of the stairs with his hood up, holding a knife. The attacker moves away when seen, while Mr Verite calls “for everyone to come over and block him in”.

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Jonathan Hayes is at work in an office located across the landing from the dance studio when he hears screaming and looks out of the window to see some children running across the car park.

He leaves his desk intending to go outside to help but, as he walks on to the landing, he sees a child on the floor, motionless and bleeding. The attacker is crouching over her but starts to follow Mr Hayes as he retreats. Mr Hayes tries to grab the knife and the defendant swipes at him and stabs him in the leg. His colleague chases Rudakubana out of the office and shuts the door.

Car repair shop owner Colin Parry is also now on the scene, after being phoned by a colleague who’d heard the screaming next door. He sees children running past, some lying on the floor injured.

11.57am: The first police officer, Sergeant Gillespie, arrives at the scene to find Rudakubana holding the knife, which he drops when ordered to do so by the officer.

Mr Verite, a former rugby league player for Wigan and Salford, follows officers inside and sees blood everywhere as two officers tackle the attacker to the floor. He carries an injured child out to an ambulance and stays with her.

Police find Heidi Liddle and a little girl she protected hiding in a toilet. They are escorted from the building crying.

11.59am: Rudakubana is arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, then further arrested on suspicion of murder three minutes later.

Rudakubana stabbed 11 children and two adults (Leanne Lucas and John Hayes) – causing the deaths of Alice da Silva Aguiar (nine), Bebe King (six) and Elsie Dot Stancombe (seven).

He was taken to Copy Lane police station where he remained silent throughout his interviews with officers.

Despite later discovering he had a wide interest in violence, genocide and terrorism from an analysis of his digital devices, police say they still don’t know why he carried out the attack.

In the hours after the stabbings, false rumours spread online claiming the suspect was an asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK on a small boat, sparking a wave of rioting and unrest across the country.

Read more:
Southport murders: Missed opportunities
‘Terrorism has changed’, PM says

On Monday, as his trial was about to start, Rudakubana pleaded guilty to the three murders and 10 other charges of attempted murder.

He also pleaded guilty to production of a biological toxin, ricin, found in a container under his bed the day after the attack, and possession of an academic analysis of an al Qaeda training manual under the Terrorism Act.

When he was charged with the offences in October, police maintained the attack was not being treated as a terrorist incident.

During the sentencing hearing, Rudakubana repeatedly called for proceedings to be stopped, shouting: “I need to see a paramedic because I feel ill.” He was removed twice from court and wasn’t present to hear his sentence.

In his absence, Mr Justice Goose sentenced the 18-year-old to a life sentence with a minimum term of 52 years. The judge said “it is likely he will never be released and will be in custody for all his life”.

Explaining his decision, the judge added: “The prosecution have made it clear this does not meet the definition of an act of terrorism within the meaning of the legislation as there is no evidence the purpose was to advance a particular political or ideological cause. I must accept that conclusion.

“However, his culpability is equivalent in its seriousness to terrorist murders, whatever his purpose.

“What he did on July 29 caused such shock and revulsion that it must be seen as the most extreme level of crime.”

Additional reporting by Adam Parker, OSINT editor, and Freya Gibson, junior OSINT producer. Maps credit: Google Earth

The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open-source information. Through multimedia storytelling, we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.

Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK

Outfielder Jurickson Profar and the Atlanta Braves agreed on a three-year, $42 million contract Thursday, uniting the veteran coming off a career year with a team that has struggled in recent years to find a suitable left fielder.

Profar, 31, was a revelation for the San Diego Padres last year, hitting .280/.380/.459 with a career-high 24 home runs and 85 RBIs. Once the top prospect in all of baseball, Profar made his first All-Star team and won a Silver Slugger — all on a one-year, $1 million deal.

He cashed in with the Braves, who outbid a number of teams interested in Profar’s on-base skills as well as his energy that invigorated Padres supporters and infuriated rival fan bases.

Profar will join center fielder Michael Harris II and right fielder Ronald Acuña Jr., the former National League MVP coming off a torn left ACL just three years after tearing the ligament in his right knee. Without Acuña for most of last season, the Braves’ offense suffered a deep regression from 2023, when they set a single-season team record with a .501 slugging percentage.

The switch-hitting Profar can slot almost anywhere in the lineup, though he figures to begin the season toward the top as Acuña continues to rehab his knee. Beyond Harris and Acuña, Atlanta’s lineup includes All-Star third baseman Austin Riley, second baseman Ozzie Albies and first baseman Matt Olson. Profar will receive $12 million this year and $15 million in 2026 and 2027.

Atlanta is typically one of the most aggressive teams in baseball, striking early in free agency and with trades. After trading slugger Jorge Soler in late October, the Braves dabbled in minor league deals and watched as starter Max Fried went to the New York Yankees, starter Charlie Morton went to the Baltimore Orioles and reliever A.J. Minter went to the New York Mets.

Profar is Atlanta’s first real addition this winter after sneaking into the postseason at 89-73 and promptly getting swept by San Diego. He has spent all 11 years of his major league career in the West divisions, debuting at 19 with the Texas Rangers. Profar never fulfilled his potential there and went to Oakland in 2019 before settling with the Padres, where he became a full-time outfielder. Over 1,119 games in his career, Profar has hit .245/.331/.395 with 111 home runs and 444 RBIs in 4,291 plate appearances.