Police contain protesters as news spreads that Axel Rudakubana has left the court from a back entrance, outside The Queen Elizabeth II Law Courts in Liverpool, north west England on January 23, 2025, after the sentencing of the Southport attacker. (Photo by Darren Staples / AFP)
Liverpool: A UK judge on Thursday sentenced a self-confessed child killer to life in custody for murdering three young girls in a frenzied stabbing spree at their summer dance class.
"I consider it likely he will never be released," judge Julian Goose said, adding that Axel Rudakubana, 18, must serve a minimum of 52 years in detention for his "extreme violence".
(FILES) A handout image released by Merseyside Police and received in London on January 20, 2025, shows the custody photograph of Axel Rudakubana. (Photo by MERSEYSIDE POLICE / AFP)
"The harm Rudakubana has caused to each family, each child and to the community has been profound and permanent," the judge told Liverpool Crown Court in northwest England.
Rudakubana had admitted three charges of killing the three girls who died in the attack in Southport -- Bebe King, aged six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar.
(FILES) Police officers and forensic personnel stand behind a cordon on Hart Street in Southport, northwest England, on July 29, 2024, following a knife attack. (Photo by Darren Staples / AFP)
He also confessed to the attempted murder of eight other children and two adults, as well as possessing a knife when he burst into a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in July last year.
And he pleaded guilty to producing a biological toxin -- ricin -- and possessing an Al-Qaeda training manual.
The judge said the violent attack, which Rudakubana unleashed just nine days before his 18th birthday, took just 15 minutes.
"Had he been able to, he would have killed each and every child -- all 26 of them," the judge said.
A handout image released by Merseyside Police and received in London on January 23, 2025, shows a replica of the knife used in the attack by Axel Rudakubana. (Photo by MERSEYSIDE POLICE / AFP)
"He was prevented from murdering more only by the escape of other children."
After some of the injured girls escaped, Rudakubana "returned to continue his sustained and brutal violence against two of the youngest of those children, stabbing them multiple times," the judge added.
