Merseyside teen avoided custody after calling 999 to stop own mass attack plan

A 17-year-old from Kirkby who idolised the Southport killer was sentenced to a youth rehabilitation order after calling police himself. He had collected knives and planned a massacre on the attack's anniversary.

Kirkby teenager sentenced after confessing planned massacre inspired by Southport murders

A potential mass killing was averted when a teenager from Kirkby in Merseyside — unable to leave his back garden — rang 999 and told operators he intended to attack a public event, bbc.co.uk reports. The now 17-year-old was sentenced on Thursday to a three-year youth rehabilitation order after admitting four counts of possessing information likely to be useful to a person planning or committing an act of terrorism.

The charges related to bomb-making manuals, terrorist training guides and instructions on how to produce ricin, all downloaded onto his devices. A separate charge of making threats to kill was ordered to lie on the file.

'I assumed I would just do something quick'

On 6 August last year, emergency call handlers received an unexpected confession. The boy told the operator he had four knives packed into a backpack — later recovered by police — and had planned to carry out what he described as a swift public attack.

"I assumed I would be able to go straight out of the door and just do something quick like Jake Davidson," he said in the call. Davidson was a man immersed in incel culture who killed five people and injured two others in a Plymouth mass shooting in 2021 before turning the gun on himself.

The boy told the 999 operator that, unable to escape the house, he feared he might have to kill his mother to get out — an act that would mean "doing life and my life's worth nothing". Sentencing judge Neil Flewitt KC later said the call was made "so that the police could stop you."

Obsession with Southport attacker

As investigators searched the teenager's electronic devices and reviewed his educational and health records, a years-long descent into violent online spaces emerged. The boy, who had been diagnosed with autism and previously attended a special school, had become deeply immersed in incel culture — an online subculture largely characterised by hatred towards women and, more broadly, society at large, and linked to a series of deadly attacks in multiple countries.

Detectives found he had expressed admiration for notorious incel killers including Elliot Rodger, who killed 14 people in California in 2014, and Alek Minassian, who murdered 10 people in Canada in 2018. His most intense fixation, however, was with Axel Rudakubana, the Southport attacker who killed three schoolgirls — Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Alice Aguiar — on 29 July 2024. The teenager had purchased a green hoodie similar to the one Rudakubana wore that day.

In a note found on his phone, he wrote that Rudakubana was "a hero" and "the one person I look up to", adding: "I felt like he was speaking to me. He was me. He is the black version of me." In other messages he referred to himself as an "Axelcel" and stated that after the Southport murders he had "never felt more heard, listened to and inspired in my life."

Anniversary attack planned for Southport

The boy's original plan, disclosed in his 999 call, was to re-enact the Southport attack on its first anniversary. He was unable to identify a suitable event close enough to his home. On 13 May 2025 he had in fact travelled to Southport and visited the site of the killings — a dance studio that had been hosting a Taylor Swift-themed children's workshop when Rudakubana entered.

In TikTok messages to a friend, he wrote "77 days until Axel two" and "hopefully more than three," referring to the number of victims. He also expressed anxiety about not obtaining "many kills." In a separate message he stated: "I hope every single non special-needs life is destroyed. Whether by rape murder torture [I don't care] I'll enjoy slaughtering you all."

The teenager stashed knives and had discussed potential targets, including a primary school and an LGBT pride event. His home in Kirkby also contained material from which he had researched carrying out a mass killing.

Twice referred to Prevent

The behaviour did not emerge without warning. Detectives established that the boy had been referred twice to Prevent, the government's counter-extremism programme. The first referral came in 2021, after teachers heard him expressing admiration for the ISIS terror group. A panel concluded his conduct was driven by autism rather than ideological extremism and recorded no ongoing counter-terrorism concerns.

A second referral followed in May 2025, after he was heard discussing Southport and the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing. That assessment was still under way at the time of his arrest. In messages to a friend, the teenager gloated that the second referral made him a "true Axelcel" and expressed hope his case would be closed again, as Rudakubana's had been, because he had "no clear ideology."

Alongside his research into mass killings, searches on his devices also included "what should I do if I want to kill people" and "UK hotline for thoughts about killing others" — indications, prosecutors and the court noted, that the boy was himself disturbed by his own obsessions.

Supervision over custody

Judge Flewitt stopped short of imposing a custodial sentence, telling the court the public would be better protected through intensive supervision and youth offending support services than by detention. The three-year youth rehabilitation order was imposed accordingly.

Bethan David, head of the Crown Prosecution Service's Counter Terrorism Division, said after sentencing: "This was a deeply concerning case involving a young person who had been drawn towards extreme and violent ideology, with the potential for very serious harm."

The boy, who told police he "lacked empathy and morality" and had wanted to get help, cannot be named.

Source: The Sun