LONDON (AP) — Prime Minister Keir Starmer summoned British police chiefs for a crisis meeting Thursday over violent unrest that followed a stabbing rampage that killed three young girls as the 17-year-old suspect appeared in court to face three counts of murder and 10 of attempted murder.
The attack Monday on children at a Taylor Swift-themed summer holiday dance class shocked a country where knife crime is a long-standing and vexing problem, though mass stabbings are rare. The deaths have been used by far-right activists to stoke anger at immigrants and Muslims — though the suspect is not an immigrant, and his religion has not been disclosed.
The suspect has not been publicly named because he is under 18, but police say he was born in Britain. He has not been charged with terrorism offenses but faces three counts of murder over the deaths of Alice Dasilva Aguiar, 9, Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7, and Bebe King, 6, in the seaside town of Southport in northwest England.
He also has been charged with 10 counts of attempted murder for the eight children and two adults who were injured.
The adults, who were listed in critical condition, were publicly named for the first time as Leanne Lucas, who led the dance class, and John Hayes, who worked nearby and intervened in the attack to protect children. The wounded children cannot be named because of their ages.
Two of the children were discharged Thursday, Alder Hey Children’s hospital said. Five others were in stable condition at the hospital.
Police have not disclosed a motive for the crime, but other new details emerged during the suspect’s first appearance at Liverpool Magistrates’ Court.
The alleged murder weapon was a kitchen knife with a curved blade, according to an additional charge he faces. It was also revealed that the suspect is just a week shy of becoming an adult when he turns 18.
The suspect, wearing a gray tracksuit, smiled briefly at reporters before sitting down in the courtroom. He then pulled his sweatshirt above his nose and held his head low during the brief hearing. He did not speak.
Neither the teen’s parents nor family members of victims were in court.
Far-right demonstrators — fueled, in part, by online misinformation — have held several violent protests, ostensibly in response to the attack, clashing with police outside a mosque in Southport on Tuesday and causing a melee near the prime minister’s office in London the next day.
Starmer’s office said he would tell police leaders that “while the right to peaceful protest must be protected at all costs, he will be clear that criminals who exploit that right in order to sow hatred and carry out violent acts will face the full force of the law.”
Hundreds of protesters chanting “we want our country back” hurled beer cans and bottles near the prime minister’s Downing Street residence in London on Wednesday evening, and launched flares at a nearby statue of wartime leader Winston Churchill. More than 100 people were arrested for offenses including violent disorder and assault on an emergency worker, London’s Metropolitan Police force said.
Police officers were pelted with bottles and eggs in the town of Hartlepool in northeast England, where a police car was set ablaze, as far-right groups seek to stir anger over an attack they have sought to link to immigrants. A smaller disturbance was reported in Manchester.
On Tuesday night a crowd of several hundred people hurled bricks and bottles at riot police in Southport, set garbage bins and vehicles on fire and looted a store, hours after a peaceful vigil for the stabbing victims.
“I am absolutely appalled and disgusted at the level of violence that was shown towards my officers,” Merseyside Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said. “Some of the first responders who attended that awful scene on Monday … then were faced with that level of violence.”
Police said a name circulating on social media purported to be the suspect’s — spread by far-right activists and accounts of murky origin purporting to be news organizations — was incorrect and that the suspect was born in Britain, contrary to online claims he was an asylum-seeker.
Patrick Hurley, a local lawmaker, said the violence by “beered-up thugs” was the result of “propaganda and lies” spread on social media.
“This misinformation doesn’t just exist on people’s internet browsers and on people’s phones. It has real world impact,” he said.
Britain’s worst attack on children was in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot and killed 16 kindergartners and their teacher in a school gymnasium in Dunblane, Scotland. The United Kingdom subsequently banned the private ownership of almost all handguns.
While knives are used in about 40% of homicides each year, mass stabbings are unusual. But a recent rise in knife crime has stoked anxieties and led to calls for the government to do more to clamp down on bladed weapons, by far the most commonly used instruments in U.K. homicides.
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