Brianna Ghey's teenage killers will be named as judge lifts anonymity of boy and girl who stabbed schoolgirl to death
21 December 2023, 12:02 | Updated: 21 December 2023, 12:43
Brianna Ghey's murderers can be named at their sentencing next year, a judge has ruled.
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Two teenagers, a boy and a girl, were convicted of killing the transgender girl in Warrington in February.
She was stabbed 28 times in a park.
Their ages - 16 - had stopped them being identified but calls grew to get their names out in public.
But judge, Mrs Justice Yip, ruled their names can be publicly revealed at their sentencing on February 2 due to the 'particularly brutal' way in which Brianna was targeted, meaning there was a strong public interest in knowing their names to help a full understanding of what took place.
Read more: Brianna Ghey's teenage killers can be named at sentencing, judge rules
Then aged 15, they launched a frenzied knife attack as Brianna walked in Culcheth Linear Park on February 11.
The pair - Boy Y and Girl X - meticulously plotted the ambush, fantasised about stabbing her and had a "kill list" with other young people on it.
Though she disliked leaving home, she set off on the bus to meet the two teens in Culcheth village, sending a text to her mum on the way which said she felt scared.
The pair then walked her down narrow alleys and into the park, arriving at a bench where Brianna's body would later be found.
The killers were seen running from there through a field, then dumped her phone and acted normally in a hope to avoid capture - and part of a plan that was found written down by the girl after she was arrested.
Boy Y, meanwhile, was found with a bloodied knife in his bedroom. Deleted messages on their phones were recovered by officers.
Each would later blame the other for the killing.
Brianna's devastated mother, Esther, said the teenagers did not "display an ounce of remorse for what they have done" and was "glad they will spend many years in prison away from society".
"To now know how scared my usually fearless child must have been when she was alone in the park with someone that she called her friend will haunt me forever," she added.
DCI Mike Evans, of Cheshire Police, said: "We still don't know why they did it other than they have a real thirst for murder. Brianna had never done anything to either of them.
"They are essentially two warped individuals who have lived out what they would describe as a fantasy."
