Full details of Southport killer’s three Prevent referrals in 16 months

Southport child killer Axel Rudakubana talked about killing a school bully, drew up a hit list and praised terrorist atrocities including the Manchester Arena attack, but had three referrals to the counter-terrorism scheme Prevent in a 16-month period closed with no further action.

A review found that the violence-obsessed loner should have been passed to the higher level support scheme Channel, but staff were too focused on the fact he did not follow any particular murderous ideology.

In the months before he was first referred, Rudakubana had contacted the National Crime Agency in April 2019 to say he was being bullied and had taken a knife to school.

He was excluded from Range High School in Merseyside that October, having admitted he had taken a knife to school 10 times.

The following month at Acorns School in Ormskirk, he was found researching US school shootings during an IT lesson, and in the December talked about drawing guns and asked for a picture of a severed head during an art lesson.

He also talked about watching videos of people hurting themselves, made a graphic comment about a drill bit breaking and killing someone, and suggested the Manchester Arena attack was “a good thing”, a Prevent learning review published on Wednesday said.

Days after he was referred to Prevent in December 2019, aged just 13, he went back to his old school and attacked a pupil with a hockey stick, causing actual bodily harm, and was found in possession of a knife.

During a police interview, a family member revealed that he had a hit list of three targets, two males and an unknown female. He said he had not intended to use the knife.

But Merseyside Police provided information to say Rudakubana “was intending to hit the victim with the hockey stick and finish him off with the knife and was not bothered by the prospects of prison”.

He was referred to mental health services and assessed for autism.

On January 3 2020, police visited his house and he claimed he had been looking at news articles on the school computer, and had searched for nunchucks as part of a lesson about building things.

The review found that the decision to close his case on January 31, despite not having full details of his computer search history, was premature and that he should have been referred to Channel.

On February 1 2021 he was referred to Prevent by a teacher from his old school, Range High School, over social media posts about Muammar Gaddafi that suggested he had been radicalised, but the case was closed 16 days later.

It was found that his case, which had his name spelled incorrectly on official forms, did not meet the threshold for Channel and that he did not hold an extremist ideology.

The learning review found his full computer search history at school should have been examined, as well as further social media entries, and that the pupil who first raised concerns should have been spoken to directly as well as Rudakubana’s parents.

“This referral was closed without the level of professional curiosity expected, bearing in mind this was a second referral,” the review said.

“There were no policies in place or guidance regarding repeat or multiple referrals at the time although it was widely considered to be a potential increase in risk.”

Rudakubana’s surname was again misspelled on forms.

The referral was made by a teacher from Acorns School on April 26 2021 after Rudakubana was found searching the internet for information about bombings in London and seemed to be interested in the Israel-Palestine conflict, MI5 and the IRA.

But the referral was dismissed, partly on the grounds that an interest in current affairs can be an autistic trait.

The review said: “Rudakubana’s potential autism spectrum disorder and ‘special interest’, which frequently are combined, are part of the reasons that make him susceptible to being drawn into terrorism.

“When taken in context the potential special interests in mass killings, terrorist acts and a capability to commit violence, then there is a potential vulnerability to being drawn into terrorism.”

The case was closed on May 10.