Teenage boy acquitted of murder and manslaughter after killing girl

[StarlightRobot]

Is anyone else baffled by the acquittal of a teenage boy who stabbed and killed nine year old Aria Thorpe. I can vaguely understand the acquittal for murder but how on earth has he been acquitted for manslaughter? He got a knife from the kitchen and stabbed her in the cheat while she was eating her dinner for goodness’ sake! Then he left her bleeding to death and hid on a train. It’s another example of the lives of girls just not mattering.

What sort of 15 year old thinks you can even “play” with a knife? There’s no suggestion he has developmental issue where he wouldn’t understand this.

He was 15, not 5. He would be well aware a knife isn’t any household object and jabbing it at someone is likely to cause severe injury, and in this case, death.

So if I pick up a knife and use it to stab my DH is that a grey area because I normally use it to chop vegetables? Of course it isn’t. Domestic knives are commonly used in homes as murder weapons.

I don’t know how many more times I can repeat this.

Just in case you need a full illustrated example; here is one:

https://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/crime/abusive-boyfriend-jailed-after-threatening-girlfriend-with-knife-at-northampton-home-and-sending-hundreds-of-offensive-and-frightening-messages-to-her-3164789

Using a knife to scare/threaten someone is where it can become an illegal activity and that is why it’s a grey area. Because the jury have to decide whether he was threatening her, or messing about.

FWIW I don’t believe his version of events at all, I just understand why the jury went the way it did

Yes the Vickers case, father to daughter, he was found guilty

Where does it say he went off to find his mates?

That’s not what I was saying at all.

But seriously what’s to stop anyone saying this as a defence now? I could pick up a knife, stab dh in the chest and then say we were playing. Obviously if it’s true and it doesn’t meet the legal definition of a crime then people shouldn’t be locked up. My issue is that some people may potentially lie. 🤷‍♀️

It depends what you mean by scare. In another quote he says he wanted to make her flinch, which is surely something we've all seen kids do to each other. Yes, scare and make her jump, not make her scared as in terrified for her life.

its you that isn’t understanding the law. If you were using a knife to threaten and intimidate…illegal, so manslaughter.

if you were messing about with a knife…not necessarily illegal, so not manslaughter

Even if he was messing about it can absolutely still be manslaughter with reckless intent. But I don’t think that applied here.

Sorry but your legal knowledge is terrible and so inaccurate you really shouldn’t be posting.

I fear people aren’t going to get it…it doesn’t matter how basic it gets broken down.

Well there isn't anything is there unless the prosecutors can produce evidence to prove your guilt. What are you hoping for in that situation?

So if I messed about by throwing rocks off a motorway bridge, and one hit a car and killed the occupant, what would I be charged with?

Ok dear!

but I’m the one who agreed with the jury, and the judge did too because they didn’t overturn the verdict.

there has to be an element of illegal activity for manslaughter. Simple!

manslaughter obviously

You'd have deliberately thrown the rocks so that's competely different. A more useful annalogy would be if you were messing around with rocks on a bridge and one accidentally fell off.

I’m embarrassed for you.

Also only the boy had a knife. It’s not as though they were trying to sword fight or anything like that. We know from the reporting that she was in the lounge having her dinner on the sofa, he went into the kitchen and got the knife because (his words) he wanted to scare her, and then she was killed. That doesn’t sound like play and I can’t imagine (this is speculation but reasonably so) that an 8 year old girl would want to play a game that involves a teenage boy waving a knife towards her. And then his behaviour afterwards, running away while she was bleeding and dying is very disturbing. Also we are not talking about a young boy, he was 15.

He deliberately advanced on her with a knife.

Yeah they could lie…I think that’s what has happened here. But if the lie cannot be disproved and it could be deemed logical then the verdict would not be guilty

Oh ffs…you aren’t going to get it ever are you. Why do you think you know more than the lawyers, jury, and judge in this case?

haha amazing 😂🤣

This sounds like utter nonsense and not really in line with other cases.
So you just kill anyone with a knife in your home and it’s totally fine because it’s a household object? Rubbish!

There was case 2025, Simon Vickers, convicted of killing his step daughter claiming they were play fighting. I do want to read the transcript if this case as I cannot understand anything about it. Why was he there, why was he trying to make her flinch with a dangerous object and his reaction after he fudi it. The jury only took 2 hours to reach their verdict, there’s obviously much more to this. Poor girl and poor family.

So you can be cleared of killing someone by claiming it was "play fighting"? In fact, the girl wasn't playing. He admitted he just went and got the knife and started pointing it at her. She was 9.