Violent videos watched by Southport killer 'are still online'

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper
-Credit:Lucy North/PA Wire


Violent videos which Southport killer Axel Rudakubana watched are still online after the Government asked social media companies for them to be removed, Yvette Cooper has said.

The Home Secretary was asked by the BBC ’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg if social media companies had complied with her request for the content to be removed.

She replied: “There has been some further contact with some of the social media companies, but our understanding is that many of those materials … that material is still available online. I think, frankly, that is disgraceful, because I think they have a moral responsibility to act.” Join the North Wales Live Whatsapp community now

ADVERTISEMENT

READ MORE: Five injured in horror stabbing near Asda supermarket

READ MORE: He murdered his son's girlfriend in her own home then went to buy a custard slice

New measures in the Online Safety Act will help to bring down such material when they come into force in a few months’ time, the Home Secretary said.

Ms Cooper added: “We need to bring in the requirements to make sure we’ve got those legal powers in place and we will implement that.

“We are being clear that we are prepared to go further if the Online Safety Act measures are not working as effectively as we need them to do.”

Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, died following the attack at the Taylor Swift-themed class in The Hart Space on a small business park in the seaside town shortly before midday on July 29 last year.

ADVERTISEMENT

On the first day of his trial at Liverpool Crown Court on January 20, Rudakubana admitted their murders. The child killer, of Banks, Lancashire, who was 17 at the time, also pleaded guilty to the attempted murders of eight other children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, class instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes

Last week the Ministry of Justice denied the 18-year-old had been attacked in prison.