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After keeping his identity unknown for days, a court in the UK has lifted the restrictions in naming the 17-year-old accused in the Southport stabbing case. The teen has been identified as Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, who according to neighbours, is ‘quiet and introverted’. His motive for killing the three girls — aged six, seven and nine — is yet to be ascertained read more
 "Who is Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, the 17-year-old who ‘killed’ 3 children?")
Axel Rudakubana, pictured when he was younger, is accused of murder and attempted murder in the Southport stabbing case. Image Courtesy: Liverpool Echo
Britain finally has a name and face to the 17-year-old who has been charged with the murders of three young girls in the seaside town of Southport and the ensuing riots that have shaken the core of the country.
On Thursday, when the teen was presented in the Liverpool court where he was charged with three counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder, the judge said the suspect could be named, despite being a minor, keeping in mind the “idiotic rioting” that took place in parts of the UK.
After the restrictions were lifted, the 17-year-old has been identified as Axel Muganwa Rudakubana.
But who is Rudakubana? What was his motive behind the Southport stabbing? And why has he been named contrary to British law? We get you all the answers.
Inside the life of Rudakubana
Despite what social media accounts reported earlier, Axel Muganwa Rudakubana is not an asylum seeker, nor did he recently arrive in Britain by crossing the English Channel illegally on a raft. Nor was he a refugee on a watch list.
The 17-year-old was born in Cardiff, Wales. His parents are originally from Rwanda and they have been living in Southport for some time. In court, the prosecution said that Rudakubana had been “diagnosed with autism” and had been “unwilling to leave the house and communicate with family for a period of time”.
Speaking to Mirror, neighbours of the Rudakubana family described the teen to be shy and introverted and could often be heard singing inside his family home in Banks, Lancashire. One resident was quoted as saying: “It’s a massive shock. He would come in from school and be singing. He never went out, we never saw them. We never spoke to them more than to say hello in seven years.”
Neighbours further said that the Rudakubana family was heavily involved with a local church, and described the teen as a “quiet choir boy”. He also was part of a school drama group that once took part in a show at the Shaftesbury Theatre in the West End. Moreover, he was trained in Karate alongside his dad.
While in court on Thursday, the teen was seated and seen covering his whole face, with his grey sweatshirt pulled up to his hairline, rocking back and forth and side to side at times. Earlier on Monday, he was arrested after a stabbing incident took place at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport. He’s been accused of murdering Alice Dasilva Aguiar (9), Bebe King (6), and Elsie Dot Stancombe (7), with a kitchen knife after entering the class on Hart Street in Southport, Merseyside. Eight other children sustained knife wounds – with five of them left in a critical condition – while two adults were also critically hurt.
The motive for the crime
The 17-year-old accused has now been remanded into custody in a youth detention centre to appear at a plea and trial preparation hearing on October 25.
The motive for his actions is yet unknown as the police haven’t revealed it thus far. However, the charges reveal the alleged murder weapon was a kitchen knife with a curved blade.
Reason for naming Rudakubana
Until Thursday, the identity of the 17-year-old accused of the Southport stabbing incident was unknown as per UK law. In Britain, people under 18 are usually not named by police or courts. But there are exceptions, for serious crimes and those that are of great public interest.
On Thursday, however, Judge Andrew Menary agreed to lift the restrictions on the accused’s identity.
Judge Menary said: “Continuing to prevent the full reporting has the disadvantage of allowing others to spread misinformation in a vacuum. Whilst I accept it is exceptional given his age, principally because he is 18 in six days’ time, I do not make an order under section 45.”
He added that delaying reporting of Rudakubana’s name until next week could even “provide an additional excuse for a fresh round of public disorder”.
After the Southport stabbing on Monday, misleading posts and false rumours flooded the internet about the attacker’s identity, with some involving anti-Muslim rhetoric and hate. This led to a group of 200-300 rioters descending on the town on Tuesday, throwing bricks, wheelie bins, concrete and even vandalising a mosque.
The ensuing violence injured more than 50 officers and three police dogs. The violence also spread to other parts of the UK; on Wednesday night, protests rocked London, and the northern cities of Hartlepool and Manchester.
In London, tensions flared at the demonstration outside UK PM Keir Starmer’s 10 Downing Street residence, with scuffles and bottles thrown at the police, and shouts of “shame on you”. In Hartlepool, northeast England, demonstrators set police cars on fire and threw objects at the officers, with police saying eight arrests were made. Hartlepool police said officers faced having “missiles, glass bottles and eggs being thrown at them, with several suffering minor injuries”.
Starmer reacts
On Thursday even as protests continued, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer met with police chiefs from across the country to discuss how to quell the violence that erupted in the nights following Monday’s killings.
At the meeting, he denounced the violence and praised the police and other emergency services for the way they had handled it.
In a press conference, he then said: “As far as the far-right is concerned, this is coordinated, this is deliberate.
“This is not a protest that just got out of hand. It is a group of individuals who are absolutely bent on violence.”
He also warned social media companies that they had to uphold the law over disinformation. “It’s also a crime and it’s happening on your premises,” Starmer said of the proliferation of disinformation, which helped spark the violence.
With inputs from agencies
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