Brianna Ghey’s killers sentenced to life for ‘sadistic’ murder
The teenagers who stabbed Brianna Ghey, 16, to death in a brutal attack in a public park last February have each been given a life sentence.
Teenagers Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe, both aged 16, have been given life sentences at Manchester Crown Court and ordered to serve a minimum term of 22 and 20 years respectively before parole.
The judge said the murder was “brutal” and “sadistic” and that a secondary motive was Brianna’s trans identity.
Both aged 15 at the time, Jenkinson and Ratcliffe have been identified for the first time as they were sentenced on Friday after a senior judge lifted a ban on naming them.
Anxious and vulnerable schoolgirl Brianna was stabbed with a hunting knife 28 times in her head, neck, chest and back after being lured to Linear Park, Culcheth, a village near Warrington, Cheshire, on 11 February last year.
Addressing Ratcliffe, Mrs Justice Yip said it would be “wholly wrong” to suggest he was under Jenkinson’s control when the murder took place.
However, she told the court Ratcliffe was not the “driving force” behind Brianna’s murder – Jenkinson was.
Mrs Justice Yip added: “Brianna was only 16-years-old. She had her whole life ahead of her. This case is unusual and it has shocked the public.”
She said Jenkinson had “enjoyed” killing Brianna.
“Scarlett, your motivation was to act out your fantasies. Brianna’s injuries showed she was killed with exceptional brutality,” Mrs Justice Yip continued.
“This was a murder [that] involved sadistic conduct.
“You both took part in a brutal and planned murder which was sadistic in nature and a secondary motivation was hostility to Brianna because of her transgender identity.”
Looking at the aggravating factors, she highlighted that Brianna’s murder involved a significant amount of planning, which began with Jenkinson who then brought Ratcliffe in on the plan.
The judge said she has to bear in mind that Jenkinson attempted to poison Brianna, and both were involved in a failed attempt to kill her in January.
“Brianna was vulnerable,” Justice Yip said, and the pair picked her because they thought she would be an easy target and abused her friendship.
Brianna’s parents told the sentencing hearing the pair should never be released from prison, with her mother Esther Ghey saying she felt her daughter’s killers still pose a danger to society.
In a victim impact statement read to the court, Ms Ghey said: “I don’t believe that someone who is so disturbed and obsessed with murder and torture would ever be able to be rehabilitated.
“I have moments where I feel sorry for them because they have also ruined their own lives, but I have to remember that they felt no empathy for Brianna when they left her bleeding to death after their premeditated and vicious attack, which was carried out not because Brianna had done anything wrong, but just because one hated trans people and the other thought it would be fun.”
In her victim impact statement, Brianna’s sister Alisha Ghey said she now struggled to trust new people because it was “Brianna’s friend who she trusted who ended her life”.
“No-one can ever make me feel better. The only thing that would is hearing her voice and laughter, and I must carry that pain for the rest of my life,” she said.
