Two boys aged 16 stabbed to death just a mile apart
Police say teen murders are linked as they hunt for mystery car
TWO 16-year-old boys have been stabbed to death a mile apart in linked murders around the same time.
Kearne Solanke and Charlie Bartolo were killed in London on Saturday evening.
Earlier in the day, a 31-year-old man died in a fight on a bridge in another part of the capital.
Detectives believe the teenagers’ deaths in Thamesmead, southeast London, are connected and were last night trying to trace a 4x4 car seen at both locations in the days before the killings.
They said Kearne was attacked beside a bin shed around 5pm while Charlie was killed about the same time on a street close to his home. A dark-coloured 4x4 with silver roof bars was previously seen at both locations.
Detective Superintendent Richard McDonagh said: ‘Colleagues are treating the two murders as linked. We are shocked and appalled. Detectives will work tirelessly to discover what happened.’
Relatives and friends laid flowers and left candles and other tributes at the scenes yesterday.
A woman who knew both boys said last night: ‘They were good sons. They were both good kids and were both loved by so many people. They were first-born sons and were loved by their mothers. They knew each other... but they were not close friends.’
Kearne’s aunt Samantha Metcalfe, 36, said: ‘Kearne was the loveliest boy you could ever meet, with a contagious smile, always happy. We’ve got no idea at all what happened. I’m waiting to hear more from his mum, but she’s too upset to speak at the moment.’ She added Kearne was ‘just in the wrong place at the wrong time’. At the scene where Charlie died, local resident Kirsty Bashford, 27, said: ‘I heard a woman scream... I looked out my window and the kid was lying in the road, and there were three or four paramedics trying to do CPR.
‘After that they took him away in an ambulance and there was a pool of blood on the floor.’ The killings mean 13 teenagers have been murdered in London this year. Meanwhile, Reece Newcombe, 31, died after being stabbed with broken glass in a fight on Richmond Bridge in south-west London around 4am on Saturday. Police appealed for onlookers who filmed the clash on their mobile phones to come forward. A GoFundMe bid to raise £1,000 for the victim’s daughter hit £31,000 last night.