Two 13-year-old boys were found guilty this Friday, September 27 in the United Kingdom for the machete murder of a 19-year-old man. They were sentenced to at least eight and a half years in prison and are subject to a lifetime probationary regime.
A first in 31 years. The United Kingdom justice system sentenced two 13-year-old boys this Friday to an indefinite prison sentence with the possibility of requesting release after eight and a half years, for the murder of a 19-year-old young man in 2023.
If they are released from prison, they will be subject to a lifetime probationary regime.
On November 13, 2023, the two boys, whose identity cannot be revealed due to their minority, killed Shawn Seesahai with a machete, who was with friends in a park in Wolverhampton, a city in the center of England.
Aged 12 at the time of the crime, they are the youngest people convicted of murder in the United Kingdom since 1993, and the youngest to have committed a stabbing murder in the country.
An outburst of gratuitous violence
“What you did is horrible and shocking. You didn’t know Shawn, he was a stranger to you,” Judge Amanda Tipples said, addressing the two teenagers.
Shawn Seesahai, originally from Anguilla in the Caribbean, had traveled to the UK to have cataracts treated. The victim was first struck in the shoulder before receiving further blows with the 42cm machete and being trampled and killed.
The police subsequently discovered the murder weapon on the bed of one of the accused. The latter had been cleaned using bleach.
The scourge of bladed weapons
Prosecutors’ spokesperson Jonathan Roe responded to this particularly difficult case by saying: “As prosecutors, we often deal with atrocious cases, but this case is particularly upsetting because of the utter absurdity and devastating consequences of the actions of the accused.”
“At 12 years old, the accused should have enjoyed their childhood rather than arming themselves with a machete and killing an innocent person,” he added.
The United Kingdom is experiencing an increase in knife violence (attacks on people, burglaries, etc.), which often involve young people.
So much so that a ban on machetes and “zombie” style knives (double-edged weapons with curved blades) came into force on Tuesday.
