Girl of 12 ‘stabbed to death over online row’
Boy, 14, ‘laughed’ after attack
A BOY aged 14 laughed after stabbing a 12-year-old girl to death in a row over video footage being posted on Snapchat, a court was told yesterday.
Ava White had been ‘hanging out’ with a group of girls hours after crowds watched Liverpool’s Christmas lights switch-on when she was stabbed in the neck, a jury heard.
They had been ‘singing and dancing and generally messing around’ when they encountered another group of children, one of whom began filming Ava’s ‘antics’, it was alleged.
Ava, who was not carrying any kind of weapon, demanded that the boy delete the footage as a ‘heated’ argument escalated into pushing and shoving, Liverpool Crown Court heard.
‘His response to this confrontation was to pull out his knife and stab Ava in the neck,’ prosecutor Charlotte Newell QC said. Ava clutched her neck, with her friends initially assuming she had been punched or strangled.
But the young girl had suffered a single wound more than two inches deep, which caused catastrophic bleeding. She died later in Liverpool’s Alder Hey Children’s Hospital.
Meanwhile the 14-year-old boy, who had come to the city centre with a three-inch flick-knife, tried to cover up what happened by discarding the blade, the phone and his coat, Miss Newell said. Later that evening he allegedly told police ‘a series of lies’, including that he hadn’t been there and that someone else had killed Ava.
The youth, who cannot be named due to his age, appeared via a videolink at the first day of his trial yesterday, and is expected to say he stabbed Ava in self-defence. Jurors were told he has ADHD and has been given a fidget toy to help him concentrate.
Members of Ava’s family sobbed in the gallery as jurors were shown CCTV footage of the fatal stabbing near the Liverpool One shopping area.
She had been with a group of around ten friends and relatives aged between 11 and 15, the court heard.
Some were swigging from vodka they had poured into water bottles as the girls danced, sang and cuddled.
They also pulled up plants from pots near the Royal Court Theatre and threw them at one another before being moved on by a security guard.
The alleged killer was with his own friends aged 13 to 15 who had a ‘passing knowledge’ of Ava’s group.
Miss Newell said the defendant took out his phone and began filming Ava as she was dragged along the ground by friends, and that he intended to share it on social media app Snapchat.
A 15-year-old who was with Ava told the other youngsters ‘they could not film little kids’. Both groups then went into an alleyway where an ‘angry’ Ava and the defendant were ‘engaging’ with one another, Miss Newell said.
Moments later CCTV captured the alleged killer moving backwards as Ava approached him, followed by ‘pushing and shoving’, before he reached for his knife and stabbed her.
Miss Newell said the boy now claimed he was acting in self-defence.
‘However, his reaction at the time was to smirk, to laugh and to run away, leaving Ava to die whilst he sought to distance himself from his actions,’ she added. She said the boy told police he had been playing the video game Call of Duty at a friend’s house that evening, but after hearing he had been captured on CCTV, said Ava had tried to hit him, ‘then it just went all weird’.
The teenager denies murder and the alternative charge of manslaughter. The trial continues.
‘Demanded he delete footage of her antics’