Axel Rudakubana terror threat referrals should have been escalated, review confirms

Axel Rudakubana
-Credit:Merseyside Police


Axel Rudakubana should have been escalated and case managed by Prevent, security minister Dan Jarvis said today. The 18-year-old horrifically murdered Bebe King, six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, when he entered the Hart Space in Southport on July 29.

During the 12-minute attack, Rudakubana also injured eight other children and two adults - Leanne Lucas and John Hayes. Last month saw the teenager sentenced to 52 years in prison for the murders. Following his guilty plea on what would have been the first day of his trial, the ECHO revealed a council document stated how he had been referred to Prevent, with the counter-terror led programme confirming there had been three referrals in total.

The first referral came in 2019 when he was enrolled at The Acorns School in Ormskirk after his exclusion from Range High School in Formby. He was permanently removed from the school after he told Childline he was taking a knife into school for what he claimed was his own protection. He later admitted to taking a knife onto the school premises on 10 separate occasions.

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During his time at the special educational needs (SEN) school in West Lancashire, he was found to have displayed violent behaviour and openly discussed guns. In the learning review published today, February 5, by the government it was revealed how he also researched shootings in an ICT lesson. He was also observed to have walked around the school punching objects, such as a laminate hanging from the ceiling.

During an art lesson, Rudakubana questioned why he was able to draw images of guns buts not search them on the internet. He then asked "can we have a picture of a severed head then?". The same day as the art lesson, he was overheard talking to a pupil about watching videos of people hurting themselves. The teen also made a graphic comment about a drill bit breaking and killing someone.

It was during these incidents the first referral was made. The second came when he was reported to have made posts on Instagram relating to Libya and Colonel Gaddaffi. The third was a result of Rudakubana researching the 2017 London Bridge terror attack.

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Mr Jarvis told the House of Commons on Wednesday: "We must get Prevent right. That is why the Home Office and counter-terrorism policing commissioned a rapid Prevent learning review immediately after the attack.

“These are usually internal technical reviews intended to identify swift learning and improvement for Prevent but the importance of the families needing answers has meant that today, following close engagement with the families, we are taking the unusual step of publishing the Prevent learning review.

“I can update the House that the perpetrator was referred to Prevent three times between December 2019 when he was aged 13 and April 2021 when he was 14. Those referrals were made by his schools. The first referral reported concerns about him carrying a knife and searching for school shootings on the internet. The second referral was focused on his online activity relating to Libya and Gaddafi. His third referral was for searching for London bombings, the IRA and the Israel-Palestine conflict.

“On each of these occasions, the decision at the time was that the perpetrator should not progress to the channel multi-agency process. But the Prevent learning review found that there was sufficient risk for the perpetrator to have been managed through Prevent. It found that the referral was closed prematurely, and there was sufficient concern to keep the case active while further information was collected.”

In total, 14 recommendations have been made to the program following the 55-page report published today. The head of Counter-Terrorism Policing, Matt Jukes, said of the review into the handling of Rudakubana before his attack: “We have taken the unprecedented step of publishing the review.

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“It describes decisions made in line with policy in place at the time, in a system that was not equipped to deal with emerging risks that were very different to those it had been built to address. In this case, there were at least 15 contact points with public services – health, education and social care systems, and the police.

“We want to see a system where every one of those contacts counts, and where the sum total of all of them taken together is seen as the red flag that it should be.”

Mr Jukes said that cases where young people are drawn into extreme violence online, combined with mental health and social challenges, should have “a clear home” rather than being passed between organisations. Mr Jarvis also revealed how Rudakubana showed an interest in the 2016 Manchester Arena bombing and had spoken to others about stabbing people.

The security minister said too much emphasis was put on a lack of an ideology behind Rudakubana’s interests, which meant he was not put further through the Prevent programme. Mr Jarvis said: “The review concluded that too much focus was placed on the absence of a distinct ideology, to the detriment of considering the perpetrator’s susceptibility, grievances and complex needs.

“There was an under-exploration of the significance of his repeat referrals, and the cumulative risk, including his history of violence.”

Mr Jarvis added: “The overall conclusion of the review is that he should have been case managed through the channel multi-agency process, rather than closed to Prevent. This would have enabled to co-ordinated multi-agency risk management and support.”