I saw ‘Satanist’ girl stab Brianna at least three times, says accused boy

A BOY accused of murdering Brianna Ghey claimed he saw a 15-year-old girl – who claimed to be a Satanist – stab her ‘ at least three times’, a court heard yesterday.

The teenager, now 16 and referred to as Boy Y, made the claim at the start of his police interview, which was played to the jury at Manchester Crown Court.

The court has been told that Brianna, 16, who was transgender, died after being stabbed 28 times in Linear Park in Culcheth, Cheshire, after being lured there by Boy Y and his co-accused, referred to as Girl X.

In the interview two days after the murder, the boy, who was then 15, claimed he had been invited to meet Girl X and Brianna in the former railway cutting on Saturday, February 11. ‘We met up in Culcheth,’ he said. ‘We walked to the forest. I turned away to go

‘She was curled up on the floor’

the toilet on a tree. When I turned back around I saw [Girl X] stabbing Brianna. ‘Brianna was curled up on the floor.

‘I went over to check if Brianna was alive. I put my hands on her and got blood all over them. I panicked and went with [Girl X].’

Asked to describe what Girl X was doing, the boy made a downward motion with his hand. He said she had a knife in her hand which he had not seen before.

‘I saw her stab her at least three times... to the back and the side, the right side,’ he said. ‘I went up to Brianna to see if she was alive. I put my hand to see if she was breathing. I got blood on my hand. I panicked and ran.’

He described how Girl X seemed ‘calm’ after the stabbing but that he was ‘stressed and shocked’. The boy, from Leigh, Greater Manchester, told police that he thought he had heard a whispered conversation between Girl X and Brianna moments before the stabbing.

He said he ‘heard a thud on the floor’ as he saw Girl X stab the victim, adding that the incident lasted ‘only two seconds’.

Girl X claimed in her own police interview that after meeting her and Boy Y in the park, Brianna ‘ditched’ them to meet a 17-yearold boy from Manchester she had met online. She was ‘ upset and burst out crying’ when she learned Brianna had been killed.

‘We were sat there chilling for a bit,’ said Girl X. ‘ She [Brianna] looked at her phone. She was like, I need to go and meet this lad. She said he was 17 and from Manchester, he was going to pick her up.

‘She started having a go at me saying, “Stop interrogating me”. And she just walked off. She ditched me. We didn’t know what to do. None of us followed after her. [Boy Y] was snapping at me saying, “It’s fine, leave it”. I didn’t hear from her for the rest of the night.’

Girl X claimed she messaged Brianna that evening. She said: ‘I had a bit of a go at her, saying why did you just leave us. She didn’t respond.’ She claimed she only learned of Brianna’s death when it was ‘on the news’. She said she was ‘very emotional’ and told her mother, who called the police.

Asked by police to describe Girl X, jurors heard Boy Y said she ‘likes to joke about dead babies’, adding she was ‘not a normal person’. He told officers Girl X had said she was a ‘Satanist’ and talked about ‘stabbing things’.

In a second interview, jurors heard he discussed how Girl X had spoken of killing two other people and said: ‘I didn’t believe her. She was just trying to convince me, telling me how mentally unstable she is or something.’

Both defendants followed proceedings via a video link from the secure units where they are being held. Before the jury was played the interviews, the judge said Girl X had been diagnosed with traits of autism and Boy Y had been diagnosed with the condition.

Mrs Justice Yip said Boy Y’s autism affected his ‘presentation, communication skills, volume and tone’, adding: ‘During interviews, he spoke very quietly. The prosecution have enhanced the volume. You may notice he is not expressive, he rarely makes eye contact.’

The court heard that Boy Y had taken what the prosecution say is the murder weapon, which his father had purchased on a skiing trip, along with a pack of three throwing knives to the park.

Boy Y said he had kept the ‘ shiny’ knife in his bedroom because he ‘ liked the look of it’ and had not taken it out of the house. He said he had used it to cut himself because he had been worried about his GCSE exams.

He told officers that on the evening after the killing, he and Girl X were sending messages ‘trying to make up a cover story’.

‘I played along,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want her to think I was going do anything to make the police come after her, because I wasn’t sure if she would try and come after me.’

He added that he had then deleted all contact with her from his phone, saying he didn’t want to ‘see her again ever or speak to her, hear her, anything’.

Both defendants deny murder and blame each other for wielding the hunting knife that inflicted the fatal wounds on Brianna.

The trial continues.

‘Likes to joke about dead babies’