Guilty verdict in Brianna Ghey case

[RoyalCorgi]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/20/brianna-ghey-found-guilty-murder

Not a surprise - it felt very clear-cut.

Good, some of the evidence I read about was harrowing.

I’ve been listening to The Trial podcast. The verdict comes as no surprise.

RIP.

And “there but for the grace of God” the boy they tried to lure to the park, who changed his mind about meeting up with them, a week or so previously.

Such a terrible tragedy.
Worth posting this link (apologies that it's the Guardian) before those who repeatedly appropriate Brianna's tragic murder arrive :

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/20/why-brianna-ghey-police-quickly-ruled-out-transphobia-as-motive

One child dead, two children in prison for a considerable amount of time for murder and a massive ripple effect of people affected by the situation.

There'll be a serious case review, "lessons learnt" and then, little will actually change.

Brianna and her family have justice today at least.

RIP Brianna. I don't think any other verdict was likely.

It's nice to read a little about Brianna's life, not just as a victim. Desperately sad.

i couldn't see how any other verdict was possible.

boy Y was obviously guilty because he came home covered in Brianna's blood, with some on his knife, & girl X wouldn't have been strong enough to overpower Brianna alone.

girl X was obviously guilty because her messages showed that she planned the whole thing - as far as was possible to tell from the evidence it all [detection aside] went down exactly as she'd hoped/instructed.

RIP Brianna. What an awful tragedy.

Horrific. Why did those teenagers become obsessed with murder and torture of their fellow human beings? No compassion or mercy? Brianna's poor family having to listen to that. Rest in peace Brianna . So sad.

When I was these kids' age I was spending Saturdays helping out at stables, hanging out with my mates arguing about our favourite G N' R song, and still watched wholesome Saturday night telly with my family (like Gladiators and Blind Date). Occasionally we would neck some minging cider in the park, and once upended a bin and rolled it down the road. I have no frame of reference for the calculated hate and sadistic violence these murderers cheerfully texted about. Something has gone badly wrong.

I thought it would be all over today. It was never going to take the jury long.

Stuff of nightmares. So desperately tragic.

I was just about to start a thread but was beaten to it. What sort of society are we now living in when we have children being murdered by children? Where did it all go wrong?

Some of us may have met people like Boy Y, autistic kid who'd go along with something if egged on far enough.

Girl X's obsession with serial killers and so on to me paints a far gloomier picture, she may just be a psycho, in the true sense of the word.

I'm so sorry your story ended here, Brianna. I'm so sorry that these two stole it from you to satisfy their twisted curiosity and their need to see you suffer.

Girl X is on record saying she was creepily obsessed with Brianna and jealous of her. Boy Y said he was 'joking' when he talked about her in such a dehumanising way and said he learned it from other people. What environment was he exposed to where that kind of 'joke' is normalised?

I am glad Brianna’s family have justice, such a tragedy

The transphobic comments exchanged by the killers are chilling. Questioning gender and ideology is always important, but we surely can't deny that saying "I want to see if it screams like a man or a girl" and "I just want to see what size dick it has" is transphobia. Hatred of Brianna because of her being transgender that led to her being dehumanised in the killers' eyes.

It's a horrifying murder, and I'm glad the perpetrators have been caught and brought to justice.

So very sad, RIP Brianna. I hope these convictions will help Brianna's family a little.

I do think the online world and seemingly unfettered access to the internet by these children is a really important factor and we need to remember that although the online safety bill has been passed and hopefully will make things better for children online, there are still some criticisms about how far it has gone from bereaved parents https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67714572

I'm really disappointed that in the discussion about the online safety bill there was very often conflation between adults and children. There is an argument that adult free speech online should not be restricted but children are not developmentally able to understand or put into context a lot of the worse content on the internet and they do need to be safeguarded and until recently have not been at all on the internet.

What these children did was horrific and maybe they are psychopaths but there has been a huge safeguarding failure of Brianna yes, but also of these children. They should not have been able to access the materials they did online at their age.

I'm amazed by Jolyon Maugham, KC - King's Counsel, i.e. a very senior barrister - tweeting about this during the trial in such a way that he was criticised by the judge. From The Guardian article linked above:

Mrs Justice Yip ... took a dim view of online commentators who pronounced that the defendants were transphobic. After the case was opened, the prosecution complained about a tweet from the barrister Jolyon Maugham, the founder of the Good Law Project, saying the teenagers had exchanged “transphobic slurs”. Yip said the tweet was potentially in contempt of court, a serious crime that has previously resulted in short jail terms for those judged to have prejudiced a trial. Heer said the prosecution had deliberately not used such terms in the presence of the jury. Maugham was spoken to by police and deleted the tweet, the court heard. Maugham told the Guardian: “Some weeks back I deleted several tweets about the trial. I also said to the judge I would – and I think it’s important to do this when you make a mistake – publicly apologise. I haven’t been able to do that until now, now the trial has ended. The issues I raised are very important but it was the wrong time for me to bring them up.”

I'm pleased Briannas family have some justice and this didn't drag on over the Christmas period which will be hard enough for them.

I'm horrified that two 15 year old ended up killing, whatever was going on in their lives to lead to this, they clearly didn't have the support or guidance or intervention they needed.

I hope the other children on their list are getting the support they need.

India willoughbys vile behaviour really has no limits. These kids were accessing the darkweb, not reading the musings of feminist

That poor child, hopefully they can rest in peace now justice has been brought. The two teens involved must have had a horrific home life themselves, not that that in any way excuses it. I hope their parents are very closely looked at.

Desperately sorry for that poor child and their family, I hope that those poor parents have some sense of relief that today is over.

Just no time for anyone trying to make political or personal capital out of this awful case. None.

The whole thing was horrendous. I'm not sure whether the "justice" of these guilty verdicts will be enough to help Brianna's family get over hearing such sadistic discussions from the murderers, but I do hope they will be all right (the family, not the murderers!). R.I.P., Brianna.