Boy who stabbed Alfie Lewis, 15, on way home from school guilty of murder
Alfie was stabbed to death ‘in full view’ of pupils leaving a primary school in the Horsforth area of Leeds last November.
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A 15-year-old boy who stabbed another teenager through the heart on the way home from school has been found guilty of murder.
Alfie Lewis, 15, was stabbed to death “in full view” of pupils leaving a primary school in the Horsforth area of Leeds last November.
A schoolboy, who was 14 at the time, admitted stabbing Alfie with a 13cm-long kitchen knife he had brought from home but denied murder, claiming he was scared for his life when he pulled out the weapon.
On Friday, a jury of five men and seven women at Leeds Crown Court convicted him of the offence.
Sobs were heard from Alfie’s family in the public gallery, who hugged each other as the verdict was announced. Most were wearing T-shirts with pictures of Alfie, saying “Forever 15”.
The defendant showed no visible emotion and later held hands with his parents through a gap in the dock glass before being taken away.
The judge, Mr Justice Cotter, will sentence the youth on June 21.
He told the defendant: “You have been found guilty of murder. There is only one sentence I can pass. What I have to determine is how many years you will be detained before you are able to be released.”
Opening the case to jurors last week, prosecutor Craig Hassall KC said Alfie had been walking down the street to meet friends at the end of the school day when the defendant attacked him.
He said witnesses recalled Alfie looking “surprised and shocked” and saying to the defendant: “What are you doing?” as the incident unfolded close to St Margaret’s Primary School in Town Street, Horsforth, just before 3pm on November 7 2023.
The prosecutor said: “Alfie did not get as far as meeting any of his friends that day.
“He was approached by (the defendant), and stabbed twice – once in the chest and once in the leg.
“He collapsed and died in the road close to the primary school in full view of scores of pupils leaving school and the people who were waiting to collect them.”
The prosecutor said a post-mortem examination revealed that the fatal stab injury was a 14cm deep wound to Alfie’s chest which punctured his heart.
Mr Hassall told the jury at Leeds Crown Court: “(The defendant) then fled the scene, dropping the murder weapon in the road close to the primary school.”
He said all the witnesses were “consistent” in saying that Alfie was “not the aggressor” that day.
“Several of the witnesses speak of Alfie seeming surprised and shocked at what (the defendant) was doing,” Mr Hassall told the court.
“Several of them recall hearing Alfie ask of (the defendant): ‘What are you doing?’
“None of the witnesses heard Alfie shouting at or threatening (the defendant).
“Insofar as any of the witnesses saw Alfie doing anything towards (the defendant), they describe him trying in vain to defend himself from (the defendant’s) knife.”
The defendant, who cannot be named, told the jury he was scared of Alfie following two incidents in the months before.
Most of all we would like to say thank you to our Alfie, for giving us all your love, joy, and humour and making us smile every day in the 15 years we had to enjoy and love you
The latter of these happened on Halloween when, according to the teenager, he walked past Alfie’s house with a bag of fireworks and Alfie said to him: “Give me the bag or something worse than last time is going to happen.”
The defendant said that, when he returned to school after a half-term break, he decided to take a knife from the kitchen drawer to protect himself.
Describing the incident on November 7, he told the jury he aimlessly swung the knife to keep Alfie away, adding: “I was just trying to protect my own life.”
Speaking outside court after the verdict, Alfie Lewis’s brother, Antony Lewis, thanked the jury “for reaching what, to us, appears a sensible and obvious conclusion, that Alfie did not pose a threat to anyone around him, and his death was senseless”.
Reading a statement on behalf of the family, Mr Lewis said: “The only justice we would want is for Alfie to come home, to me and my mum, and to us as a family.
“Most of all we would like to say thank you to our Alfie, for giving us all your love, joy, and humour and making us smile every day in the 15 years we had to enjoy and love you.
It is a tragedy that illustrates the appalling consequences of knife crime
“You are always in our hearts and our minds, and until we are all together again keep dancing in the sky our beautiful boy. We miss you and we love you, always.”
Senior investigating officer, Detective Chief Inspector Stacey Atkinson said Alfie “was not involved in gangs or any other criminality that could have put him at risk of knife crime”.
“He had simply gone to meet his friends from school and was not looking for a confrontation with anyone,” she said.
“The evidence has shown that the youth convicted of Alfie’s murder had planned and prepared to attack him, taking a kitchen knife from home, and waiting until the end of the school day, when he knew where he could find him.
“He claimed that he had acted in self-defence, but the evidence from multiple eyewitnesses has shown that he was the aggressor who launched a deliberate and determined attack, repeatedly stabbing Alfie, who was completely defenceless, leaving him fatally wounded.
“We have heard evidence of previous incidents involving Alfie and the youth but these were very minor in nature. Clearly there is nothing that could justify the murderous violence he used to end Alfie’s young life.
“Alfie’s murder occurred in a busy street at school home time and was witnessed by several children and passing members of the public. Understandably, it caused a huge amount of shock and concern in the local community.
“It is a tragedy that illustrates the appalling consequences of knife crime, and we can only hope it will hit home to young people that it can never be right to carry a knife or use violence to settle your differences.”