Two teenagers believed to be Britain’s youngest knife murderers have been jailed for a minimum of eight years and six months.
They were 12 years old when they attacked and killed 19-year-old Sean Seesahai with a machete in a park in Wolverhampton on November 13 last year.
They are thought to be the youngest children to be convicted of murder in Britain since Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, who were 11 when they were convicted of killing two-year-old James Bulger in 1993.
Judge Mr Justice Tipples had previously refused media requests to lift reporting restrictions that prevented the identification of Mr Seesahai’s killer on the basis of his age.
The victim’s parents, from the small Caribbean island of Anguilla, they were still in “great pain” and wondered whether their son had called for help – “mum or dad” – when he was attacked.
The judge began her sentence by acknowledging that the imposed prison sentence would be of no comfort to the victim’s family.
She told the boys: “When you killed Sean he was 19 years old and starting his adult life with everything to live for.
“His parents have lost a son. His sister has lost a brother.
“What you have done is horrific and shocking.” You didn’t know Sean, he was a stranger to you. He asked you to leave him and you killed both of them in an attack that lasted less than a minute.
“There’s no doubt you wanted to kill him.”
The judge added that he did not know which boy had inflicted the 23cm deep, almost penetrating wound on Mr Seesahai.
The boy had travelled to the UK for cataract surgery and was due to start studying engineering in Birmingham the day after the attack.
One of the killers was photographed wearing a mask and holding a machete with a 42.5cm black blade tucked into the waistband of his trousers just hours before the murders.
Nottingham Crown Court heard that Seesahai, who was unknown to the boys, was walking with a friend through a playground in Stourlawn when one of the 12-year-old boys pushed him on the shoulder.
Mr Seesahai was then punched, kicked, kicked and punched with the murder weapon, causing wounds to his back, legs and skull. The fatal wound was more than 20cm deep and pierced his heart.
After the murder, the boy washed the machete in bleach and hid it under his bed.
In a social media message he wrote “that’s how it is” and “idrc” (i don’t really care).
Although both sides accused each other of delivering the fatal blow, the prosecution said they “jointly attacked a man who had done nothing wrong, an unarmed man who was lying completely defenseless on the ground.”
The boys, who were 12 when they were convicted and are now 13, are thought to be the youngest children to be convicted of a knife murder in the UK.
One of the boys admitted possessing the knife before trial but the other was convicted.
Rachel Brand KC, defending the boy, who admitted buying and possessing the machete, said the boy had been “targeted” and abused by a wide range of teenagers and older men and “wishes the machete had never been taken from him”.
“He wishes he had never gone to the park. He wishes it had never happened,” she said.
Paul Lewis KC, defending the other boy, said he had never been involved in any criminal activity before, adding: “This was a one-off incident which was not premeditated. It was over within seconds. It’s clearly tragic.”
We’re shocked at how young they were”
Mr Seesahai’s parents, attending the trial, said they were shocked at how young their son’s killers looked.
His mother, Manaswari Seesahai, “We’re shocked they were so young, so small and they’d done something like that.”
“From the moment I met them I’ve been angry because of what they did to my son.”
The parents had planned to emigrate to the UK with their son and his sister, Shanna, 15, to attend school but his murder “changed everything”.
“Now I’m too scared to take my daughter,” Ms Seesahai told uae breaking News from Crocus Bay, her son’s favourite beach.
“It’s very hurtful. In the future he would be married, have children, we would have grandchildren and we would enjoy spending time with them but none of that happened.” His killers jailed for 30 years
“There must be an appropriate punishment for knife crime. Murder is murder,” his father Suresh Seesahai said. They murdered him, hacked him, hacked his legs, hacked his shoulders, beat him… they did terrible things to him.”
Kim Madill, Chief Superintendent of West Midlands Police, told Sean after the verdict: “Sean was only 19 when his life was taken by two boys, both aged 12 at the time, armed with machetes.
“This reality has hit us all hard and is both shocking and saddening. The impact of knife crime is devastating no matter where you live in the country and this issue affects us all.
“A lot of work has been done and there have been successes in some areas but it is clearly not enough.
“We are listening to families affected by knife crime and acting on their feedback to see what more we can do with partners to stop the devastation caused by knife crime.”
