KIDS WHO KILL
UK’s worst killer children – from girl, 12, who stabbed hairdresser 32 times to teen’s Corrie-inspired hammer attack
One killed a dog with a spade before attacked her 18-year-old victim
A TEENAGER who sadistically tortured a grandmother before killing her, aged just 14, has been released.
Sarah Davey was locked up indefinitely, in 1999, for the sick attack on vulnerable Lily Lilley, 71.
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The pair had been invited in for a cup of tea after befriending the pensioner in Failsworth, Greater Manchester.
But they squirted shampoo at her before battering her and cutting her legs. It was later found they had hit her so hard that Lily's false teeth had been forced down her throat.
Once Lily was dead, her body was shoved into a wheelie bin, which the pair dragged to the nearby canal to dump her corpse.
Davey was caged for the murder, which the judge called "unspeakably wicked" but was released on March 23 after going up before the parole board.
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She has been freed eight times since 2013 but each time has broken her parole conditions.
Davey is not the first UK teen to have carried out a horrific attack or murder, nor was she the last.
We look at the grisly list of killer kids in the UK, from a dog-killer who went on to murder a hairdresser to the sick 'Twilight' murders that left a mother and daughter dead.
Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe
Twisted Jenkinson and Ratcliffe, both 15, lured Brianna Ghey to a park near Warrington before they murdered her in a frenzied attack.
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Tragic Brianna was stabbed 28 times with a hunting knife and the cruel pair both blamed each other for the attack.
Chillingly, it came out that Jenkinson and Ratcliffe had been texting about their plans to kill Brianna weeks before going through with it.
In the messages, Ratcliffe referred to Brianna as "it" because she was transgender.
Brianna believed she and Jenkinson were friends when she agreed to meet the duo in the park.
Ann Maguire is remembered by family while teenage killer William Cornick is jailed for life
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During the trial, Jenkinson admitted planning to take part of Brianna's body "as a token".
Jenkinson was caged for a minimum of 22 years and Ratcliffe for a minimum of 20 years.
Twilight Killers
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Teen sweethearts Kim Edwards and Lucas Markham, both aged 14 at the time, stabbed Kim's mum Elizabeth Edwards, 49, and her younger sister Katie, 13, as they slept.
The pair were dubbed the ‘Twilight Killers’ after it emerged they ate tea cakes and ice cream and watched the vampire movie after the murders.
It had taken three attempts for the teenage killers to go through with their sick plan, as Kim fell asleep the two nights previous, meaning she wasn't able to let Markham into the house.
I knew my sister was unhinged, I just didn’t think she was that unhinged.
Kim Edward's sister Mary Cottingham
Markham became one of the youngest ever double murderers after admitting two counts of murder at Nottingham Crown Court.
Edwards admitted manslaughter but denied murdering the church-going dinner lady and her daughter due to her mental condition.
But the court heard she was the "driver" behind a "cold and brutal" plot to kill Elizabeth and Katie.
The only member of the family not killed was Edwards' older half-sister Mary Cottingham, who lived in Derby with her husband and children.
Speaking years after the killings, Mary said: “I knew my sister was unhinged, I just didn’t think she was that unhinged.”
She told The Sun: "I was expecting at least something, especially when it come to Katie. With my mum, I kind of knew that she wouldn’t show remorse because she kind of hated my mum. We all kind of knew that.
"But when it came to Katie I was expecting some and there was nothing. Even to this day there is no remorse."
Jon Venables and Robert Thompson
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Jon Venables and Robert Thompson were just ten years old when they murdered two-year-old James Bulger.
The horrifying crime, in 1993, shocked the nation when the little lad was abducted, tortured and murdered by the evil boys before being dumped on railway tracks.
Both were eventually released from prison under new identities, however Venables is now back inside for possession of indecent images of children.
Venables latest bid to be paroled was denied with the board concluding they were “concerned by continuing issues of sexual preoccupation in this case”, and warned there was “future risks” of him viewing more child sexual abuse images and of him “progressing to offences where he might have contact with children”.
Thompson is not believed to have returned to prison on any offences.
Snapchat Killers
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In December 2014 two teenagers – known later in court as Girl A and Girl B – tortured and murdered loner Angela Wrightson, filming the attack on their phones.
The teens, who were aged 13 and 14 years old at the time, successfully won a bid to have lifelong anonymity, like the Venables and Thompson, in 2021.
Dubbed the Snapchat killers the youngsters sent a selfie from inside a police van after killing tragic Angela, 39.
The teens also took a smiling picture beside their victim before continuing to batter her with a shovel, coffee table, kettle and a screw-studded stick.
Their horrific attack lasted for five hours.
They were convicted of Angela’s murder and jailed for a minimum of 15 years.
A neighbour of the girls, from Hartlepool, Co Durham, said: “Separately they could be quite sweet girls but together they were devils.”
Mary Bell
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Mary Bell strangled Martin Brown, four, and Brian Howe, three, in 1968, when she was just ten years old.
The murders took place two months apart and, after killing little Brian, she returned to his body to carve an M into his leg.
She also used a pair of scissors to cut off some of his hair, scratch his legs, and mutilate his penis.
She was said to have strangled the boys, aged four and three, "solely for the pleasure and excitement of killing".
Bell's mother Betty was a prostitute, who repeatedly tried to kill Mary as an infant, including giving her sleeping pills and pushing her out of a window.
Bell received life in detention but was released at 23 and given a fresh identity to protect her daughter, who was born four years later.
She has had three assumed identities and has moved at least five times after being identified.
Killed for ‘a dare’
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Three teenage yobs were handed the equivalent of life sentences after beating a homeless man to death.
Brothers Connor Doran, 17, and Brandon Doran, 14, and their friend Simon Evans, also 14, set upon rough-sleeping Kevin Bennett outside a supermarket.
Mr Bennett, 53, died in hospital six days after the vicious attack in Liverpool in 2012.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that ringleader Connor Doran goaded Evans to take part in the beating, saying: “I bet you haven’t got it in you to do him in.”
Evans later told his friend: “I started kicking him, I booted him and now he’s dead,” the court heard.
Will Cornick
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Schoolboy Will murdered his teacher Ann Maguire.
Cornick – described as “highly dangerous” – stabbed Ann, 61, seven times as she taught a class at Corpus Christi Catholic College in Leeds when he was 15.
After stabbing the teacher to death, he callously boasted: “I couldn’t give a s***” .
Cornick said he had a “sense of pride” after the classroom murder, and added: “Everything I’ve done is fine and dandy.”
He won't be eligible for parole before 2034.
Daniel Bartlam
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Daniel Bartlam was just 14 when he beat his mum to death in a hammer attack copied from Coronation Street.
The teen repeatedly battered Jacqueline’s face and head before setting her body alight.
Schoolboy Bartlam was obsessed with TV soap murder plots and grisly horror movies.
He kept video clips on his computer of violent scenes from Coronation Street, Hollyoaks, Emmerdale, TV drama Trial And Retribution and torture film Saw.
Four days before killing devoted mum Jacqueline, he wrote a soap script about “Daniel” murdering a woman named “Jackie” with a hammer.
'Devil's Daughter'
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Sharon Carr was aged just 12 when she stabbed 18-year-old hairdresser Katie Rackliff 32 times.
The murder went unsolved for several years, as cops were looking for an adult assailant rather than a child.
Some of the knife thrusts went clean through Katie’s body and diaries seized by police were full of sickening boasts about the murder.
Carr was dubbed the "devils daughter" for her lack of remorse in the attack.
She wrote in her diary: “I wish I could kill you again. Your screams turn me on.”
Another entry she had penned read: “Every night I see the Devil in my dreams but I realise it was just me.”
Carr had a history of sadistic violence before the murder and once used a spade to decapitate a dog.
She was convicted of the murder in 1997 and handed a sentence of at least 12 years.
Her last bid for freedom in 2023 was turned down because she was "still violent", reported.
Youth Crime Statistics
- Latest government figure show there were 59,000 arrests of children in the UK in the year ending March 2023.
- This was an increase of 9 per cent compared to the year ending March 2022 and was the second consecutive year in which arrests of children increased.
- Of those 5 per cent were for carrying weapons and 4 per cent were arrested for crimes of violence against another person
- Children aged 15 to 17 account for 74 percent of the offending population
James Fairweather
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In 2016, James Fairweather was unmasked as Britain’s youngest serial killer after murdering two strangers — then plotting to slay 15 more victims.
James Fairweather was convicted of stabbing brain-damaged James Attfield 102 times then knifing to death Nahid Almanea three months later.
He was just 15 at the time. The teen was said to be obsessed with the Yorkshire Ripper and blamed “voices in the head” for his crimes.
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James Attfield’s mum Julie Finch branded him a “monster” after the
verdict.
She added: “He was aware what he was doing, he knew right from wrong.”
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