Britain's youngest knife murderers among notorious criminals locked up in the UK in September

Britain's youngest knife murderers, who killed a stranger when they were just 12 years old, were among the notorious criminals sent to jail in the UK in September. The two boys, both from Wolverhampton cannot be named due to an anonymity order.

They were among the offenders locked up across the UK for their crimes last month. Others include a Cambridge University student who was in his final year or studying medicine before he was jailed for child sex offences.

A cab driver who sexually assaulted women after picking them up in his taxi and a stalker who tricked her victim into thinking she was a man after meeting her on a dating app will also spend time behind bars.

READ MORE: A violent coward, a masked robber and more rioters jailed

Read more court stories from the Manchester Evening News here.

Other offenders sent to jail in September include a teenager who stabbed a dad-of-two to death on Christmas Day and a man who killed a sex worker in her home during a drug-fuelled attack.

Dozens of people were also jailed for their involvement in the disorder that broke out across the UK following a knife attack in Southport. Men, women and teenagers have been locked up after rioting and looting hit cities including Manchester, Hull, Sheffield and London.

Lengthy sentences are handed to some of the worst offenders each month. These are some of the most shocking court cases that have been widely reported in the UK in recent weeks.

Britain's youngest knife murderers

Britain’s youngest knife murderers, who cannot be named for legal reasons, were been handed life sentences with a minimum term of eight-and-a-half years. The two boys killed a stranger in a brutal machete attack when they were aged just 12.

The killers, both from Wolverhampton and now 13, were convicted in June of murdering 19-year-old Shawn Seesahai, who was stabbed in the heart and suffered a skull fracture on the city’s Stowlawn playing fields on November 13 last year. They were described at Nottingham Crown Court on Thursday as “the youngest knife murderers” and are believed to be the youngest defendants convicted of murder in the UK since Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, both aged 11, were found guilty in 1993 of killing two-year-old James Bulger.

At the sentencing hearing, the judge told the boys: “When you killed Shawn he was 19, starting out in his adult life with everything to live for. His parents have lost their son. His sister has lost her brother. What you did is horrific and shocking. You did not know Shawn, he was a stranger to you. You both killed Shawn in an attack that lasted less than a minute when he asked you to move (from a bench). I am sure you intended to kill him.”

The judge added she could not be sure which of the boys had inflicted a 23cm-deep wound which almost passed all the way through Mr Seesahai’s body. Both boys blamed the other for inflicting four wounds with the machete, after a dispute with the victim about sitting on a park bench.

One of the boys admitted possession of the knife prior to the trial, while the other was found guilty of the same charge when they were both unanimously convicted of murder on June 10.

READ MORE: Britain's youngest knife murderers jailed for life after machete attack

READ MORE: Why the identities of boys, 12, who murdered teen in park are being kept secret

Explaining her reasons for the length of the minimum terms after the boys were taken down to begin their sentences of detention, High Court judge Mrs Justice Tipples said the murder was aggravated by the fact it was an attack involving two offenders. Mitigating factors included the fact the “spur-of-the-moment attack” was not premeditated, and the young age of the defendants, who were told they will remain in separate secure units where they were held on remand during their trial.

The “extremely vulnerable” first defendant, who admitted buying the murder weapon from a friend for £40 around a month before the attack, had been “groomed and exploited” by others, the court heard. The court heard the second defendant had a supportive and loving relationship with his parents and was not previously known to the police.

Seven men involved in Rotherham grooming

Seven men have been jailed for up to 25 years for the sexual abuse of two young girls in Rotherham, beginning when one was as young as 11. The seven men are the latest to been convicted following an investigation by Operation Stovewood – the UKs biggest-ever child sexual exploitation inquiry, which is looking at abuse which took place in Rotherham between 1997 and 2013.

The National Crime Agency said this case covers “some of the worst offending we have investigated under Operation Stovewood”. The agency said Mohammed Amar, Mohammed Siyab, Yasser Ajaibe, Mohammed Zameer Sadiq, Abid Saddiq, Tahir Yassin and Ramin Bari were jailed for the offences which were committed between April 2003 and April 2008.

The men regularly picked up the victims in their cars and gave them cigarettes, alcohol, cannabis and money, Sheffield Crown Court heard. The girls would then be assaulted, forced to perform sexual acts or raped.

The two victims were aged 11 and 15 when the offending began, the CPS said, and both spent time in the care system. One of the girls was taken to a hotel where she was raped by two men, while on another occasion she was locked inside one of her abuser’s homes and raped.

Amar, Ajaibe, Sadiq and Sayib abused one victim, and Yassin and Bari abused the other, according to the NCA. Saddiq, who was already serving a 20-year prison sentence for sexual offences in Rotherham handed down in 2019, abused both girls.

• Amar, 43, of Elizabeth Way, Rotherham, was convicted of two counts of indecent assault, the CPS said. He was sentenced to 14 years imprisonment with two years extended licence.
• Siyab, 45, of Stevenson Drive, Rotherham, was convicted of two counts of rape, one count of sexual intercourse with a girl under 13 and one count of trafficking. He was sentenced to 25 years imprisonment with 12 months extended licence.
• Ajaibe, 39, of Walter Street, Rotherham, was convicted of one count of indecent assault. He was sentenced to six years imprisonment with 12 months extended licence.
• Sadiq, 49, of Richard Road, Rotherham, was convicted of one count of rape and one count of sexual intercourse with a girl under 13. He was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment with 12 months extended licence.
• Saddiq, 43, formerly of Rotherham, was convicted of three counts of rape and one of indecent assault. He was sentenced to 24 years imprisonment with 12 months extended licence.
• Yassin, 38, of Burngreave Street, Sheffield, was convicted of eight counts of rape. He was sentenced to 13 years imprisonment.
• Bari, 38, Of Derby Street, Sheffield, was convicted of four counts of rape. He has been sentenced to nine years imprisonment.

Operation Stovewood was set up in the wake of the landmark Jay Report which found in 2014 that at least 1,400 girls were abused by gangs of men of mainly Pakistani heritage in Rotherham between 1997 and 2013. Thirty-six people have so far been convicted as a result of the operation.

Offenders involved in the UK riots

Dozens of people were locked up in September for their parts in the riots that spread across the UK following the killing of three girls in Southport. Across the UK, at least 300 people have now been sentenced for offences in connection with the riots since they broke out at the end of July.

Painter and decorator Thomas Birley was handed the longest prison sentence so far over the riots after he fuelled a fire outside a hotel housing hundreds of asylum seekers in Rotherham. Birley was jailed for nine years, with an extended licence period of five years, at Sheffield Crown Court. The judge told Birley, 27, his case was “unquestionably” one of the most serious of the dozens he's dealt with in the last month in relation to the rioting outside the Holiday Inn Express on August 4.

Birley, of Rowms Lane, Swinton, Rotherham, added wood to a fire in a large industrial bin which had been pushed against an exit. He also place a further bin on top of the one ablaze. Birley was filmed throwing missiles at the police, squaring up to officers while brandishing a police baton and throwing a large bin which crashed into a line of police with riot shields.

The defendant became the first person to be sentenced for arson with intent to endanger life following the 12 hours of violence in Manvers, which left 64 police officers, three horses and a dog injured. Judge Richardson heard how 22 staff in the hotel barricaded themselves into the hotel’s panic room with freezers and “thought they were going to burn to death”.

Unemployed labourer Craden McKenzie was also jailed for his role in the same incident. He was one of the first to enter the hotel housing more than 200 asylum seekers. The 26-year-old was jailed for three years after he climbed into the hotel and walked around the deserted lobby area as staff took refuge in the kitchen.

McKenzie, of Doncaster Road, Darfield, Barnsley, was also seen in a crowd which was attacking a group of outnumbered riot police with fire extinguishers and other weapons outside the building amid shouts of “burn it down”. The judge said McKenzie was a “central participant in the most serious aspects” of the disorder.

Among the other offenders jailed in September was Christopher Beard, who was seen at the front of a crowd with a “maniacal grin” during disorder in Southport. He was shown on footage “shouting”, “gesticulating” and throwing a large piece of wood towards police officers. Beard, of Stewart Road in Wigan, pleaded guilty to violent disorder and has been jailed for two years and eight months.

Lee Powell, 46, who was also jailed for his role in the Southport riots, claimed he was in the area to lay flowers but became “trapped” on the wrong side of the police line as he tried to get back to his car - an account that the judge said he "utterly" rejected. The court heard Powell "abused officers at close quarters" and threw things at them. Powell, of Fountains Road, Liverpool, was jailed for two years and four months for violent disorder.

In Newcastle, the first defendant in the UK to admit a charge of riot in connection with the events was jailed for four years and four months. Kieran Usher, 32, encouraged “mob violence” and was in a group of around 20 yobs who hurled missiles at police during a night of trouble in Sunderland on August 2, which left bystanders terrified. CCTV evidence showed Usher donning a mask and wearing a Union flag, encouraging others to participate in violence and throwing missiles at police from close range.

In Teesside, jail sentences were handed to a mother and daughter who took part in widespread disorder in Middlesbrough while they both walked the family dog. Amanda Walton, 51, was caught on CCTV throwing a missile, damaging a car wing mirror and rummaging through a bin, while footage showed Megan Davison, 24, jumping up and down on a car’s roof, assisting in smashing windows, sticking a finger up at a police officer and walking away from a shop while “concealing items”. The pair admitted violent disorder and Walton was jailed for 22 months and Davison for 20 months.

James Denholm

An electrician secretly filmed people in private situations such as in homes and bathrooms over the course of a decade. James Denholm, 34, was caught after a victim found a recording device under her bed and called police, prosecutors said.

A search was carried out at Denholm’s Aberdeen home where officers discovered various hard drives, SD cards, mobile phones, laptops and cameras. Evidence of his offending, involving 17 people, was recovered from the devices, with videos dating from June 2013 until August 2023.

A number of women were filmed in intimate situations without their consent, prosecutors said. Denholm, 34, pleaded guilty to multiple charges including voyeurism, stalking and possessing indecent images and videos of children.

He pleaded guilty to 16 charges in July and was jailed for two years and eight months at Aberdeen Sheriff Court last month, the Crown Office said. Alison McKenzie, procurator fiscal for Grampian, Highlands and Islands, described Denholm’s behaviour as “depraved”.

“James Denholm exploited a position of trust to gain access to his victims during this alarming pattern of behaviour," she said. “He filmed several individuals during private moments in places where they should have felt safe, such as their own homes and in public bathrooms.”

Denholm will remain under supervision for a further two years and six months following his release. His name has been added to the sex offenders register indefinitely and he was also made subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO) for a period of seven years.

Lorcan Elliott

A Cambridge University student who was in his final year studying medicine held his head in his hands as he was jailed for a series of child sex offences. Lorcan Elliott, 25, used a website to “find and identify young male children”, Cambridge Crown Court was told.

Prosecutor Samantha Marsh said: "The general MO was to state he was a sugar daddy and offering payment between £200 and £800 based on their sexual limits." She said the defendant posted a bank statement to prove he had money on one occasion, but there was no evidence money actually changed hands.

Ms Marsh said that Elliott would ask the boys, aged between 13 and 15, to send him indecent photos of themselves. The prosecutor said that one Snapchat user and one Dropbox user had uploaded indecent images and on the first occasion the IP address was linked to Elliot's student accommodation, while on the second it was linked to his home address.

Police searched Elliott’s student accommodation and seized two phones, and also seized a laptop from his home address in Orton Southgate near Peterborough. The devices were analysed and further images were found.

Elliott pleaded guilty to 22 child sexual offences, which the judge said spanned an indictment period of 16 months. They included three counts of making indecent images encompassing 142 category A images – the most serious level – with 118 at category B and 354 at category C. He also admitted to two counts of the distribution of indecent images, nine of engaging in sexual communication with a child and eight of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity.

Sentencing him on Wednesday to four years and eight months in prison, Judge Grey told Elliott: "What you did is the sort of foul online behaviour that causes parents the world over to fear what their children are being exposed to online."

Anas Al Mustafa

A van driver used a hidden compartment to smuggle migrants who were discovered screaming for help as they were starved of oxygen. Anas Al Mustafa, 43, was convicted of assisting unlawful migration by trafficking the seven people in a specially adapted van via a ferry between Dieppe, in France, and Newhaven, East Sussex, on February 16.

Jurors at Lewes Crown Court previously heard how the six men and one woman suffered from dehydration and a lack of air in the concealed space which was “the width of a human chest”. Prosecutor Nick Corsellis KC told the court that while the younger migrants recovered from the dehydration and heat, one man had a possible heart attack, one woman had acute kidney injury and another man went to hospital in a comatose state and suffered a stroke.

The trial heard how crew members on the Seven Sisters ship heard pleas from inside a van on deck during the journey and used an axe to break down the fake partition that was hiding the people inside to free them. The hidden compartment was two metres wide, 194cm tall and 37cm in narrow width, which forced the migrants to stand, and they could not move to any meaningful degree.

Two of the migrants had lost consciousness by the time they were rescued at around 9.20am, and all of the group were taken to hospital and treated, jurors were told. An Australian nurse and passenger on the ferry, Sari Gehle, responded to a call to assist the crew during the incident and described the female casualty as “terrified”, gripping her arm tightly repeatedly and saying “Vietnam, Vietnam”. Other male casualties she recalled being on the floor, with one vomiting and another with a cut across his left shoulder.

During the trial, Al Mustafa, of Swansea, denied knowing they were in the vehicle and told jurors he was “shocked” and “completely numb” at the discovery. He has been jailed for 10 years. Minister for Border Security and Asylum, Dame Angela Eagle, described Al Mustafa as an “evil criminal” who put “seven people’s lives at risk for cash”.

Alexandru Tapurin

A taxi driver has been jailed for 21 months after he sexually assaulted three women passengers in his vehicle. Alexandru Tapurin repeatedly asked for sex from one woman who he picked up from a city pub and forced her to engage in sexual activity, Norfolk Police said.

Later that night, in the early hours of January 20, the 36-year-old targeted a second woman, the force said. He collected the woman, who had booked the taxi via an app, from the city centre then during the journey he pulled into a side road and made repeated unwanted advances verbally and physically. Police said that after she refused him multiple times he started the engine and took her home.

Tapurin, of Norwich, collected his third victim in his cab in the early hours of January 21, and when they reached her destination he again made unwanted advances verbally and physically. Police said he told her “I’ll see you again” as she got out of the car.

Tapurin pleaded guilty to three counts of sexual assault, Norfolk Police said. The force said he was sentenced at Norwich Crown Court to 21 months in prison. He was also issued with a sexual harm prevention order and made to sign the Sex Offenders’ Register.

Detective Sergeant Ricki Peake, who led the investigation, said afterwards: “It goes without saying that women should be able to rely on a taxi to get them home safely whether they are on a night out with friends, in the city, or finishing a shift at work.”

Kersharn Dockeray-Barnett

A teenager murdered a father-of-two in a revenge stabbing on Christmas Day last year. Kersharn Dockeray-Barnett was found guilty by a jury of murdering Reece Connor, 29, by stabbing him once in the chest with a knife.

Dockeray-Barnett, who was 17 at the time of the attack and is now 18, was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 19 years at Nottingham Crown Court. The defendant, of Marchwood Close, Nottingham, who wore a light blue tracksuit, stood in the dock as his sentence was read out by the judge and then blew a kiss to his family sat in the public gallery.

The court heard that Dockeray-Barnett claimed he had used the knife in self-defence, which the jury rejected, following a previous encounter with Mr Connor in an underpass where the deceased had been the “aggressor”. Prosecution barrister John Lloyd-Jones KC said: “It is a fair inference that on that night, Kersharn Dockery-Barnett was angry following events in the underpass and he sought revenge.”

Judge Nirmal Shant KC said to the defendant: "There appears to have been some form of disagreement between you. I find on the evidence that you went to seek him out and at the end of that encounter, you killed him. It is plain to me that the second encounter came by because you wanted to teach him a lesson in relation to the first."

Adam Watson

A “cold-blooded killer” who was extradited from Belgium after fatally strangling a sex worker in a drug-fuelled attack was locked up for 21 years for her murder. Adam Watson killed mother-of two Samantha Holden, 56, at her home in Farnborough, Hampshire, on September 9, 2022, before fleeing the country later that day.

The 37-year-old from Farnborough was stopped and arrested the following day and was extradited for Ms Holden’s murder and also to complete his period of licence for a previous sexual assault offence in 2014. Watson was a client of Ms Holden, who was a sex worker and saw clients at her home address, according to the CPS.

Ms Holden's body was discovered by her son a few hours after she was killed. Watson's DNA was found underneath Ms Holden’s fingernails, around her neck, and on the cushion used to suffocate her.

Ruth Sands, a Senior Crown Prosecutor with CPS Wessex, said: "Adam Watson is a cold-blooded killer who attempted to evade justice by fleeing the country, whilst his victim still lay undiscovered."

Adele Rennie

A woman used a voice-changing application to sound like a man during a “sophisticated” stalking campaign, which saw her locked up for more than two years. Adele Rennie, 33, from Kilmarnock, East Ayrshire, pretended to be a male pharmacist when she matched with her victim on Tinder in August last year.

After exchanging numbers, Rennie, a registered sex offender, arranged to have flowers delivered to her victim’s home address, prosecutors said. The woman then arranged to go on a date with Rennie, who she believed to be a man from the fake profile.

Rennie cancelled the meeting at the last minute, which resulted in the victim believing that the Tinder account was a “catfish” profile. Six days later she received a voice note from a woman who called herself Cheryl, claiming to be a friend of the man and asking her “not to give up on him”. She then received calls from the man which she believed sounded like the voice had been altered.

The victim later received an unwanted explicit image from Rennie, who stated she did not mean anything by it and was unable to delete it. A week later the woman received a message from Rennie containing a photograph taken outside the complainer’s workplace. Prosecutors said Rennie also sent her victim a screenshot of Google Maps which showed someone outside her home and a photograph of her street which had been taken through a car window.

Police searched Rennie’s home in November and found a mobile phone that had searches for the victim in its internet history. The police also found a photograph matching the fake male profile and recovered several bank cards, which had not been declared in accordance with Rennie’s sex offender notification requirement.

Rennie was sentenced to 28 months in prison and made subject to a 12-month supervised release order. She was also placed on the sex offenders register for 10 years.

Ryan Evans

Ryan Evans murdered a mother-of-five while on police bail and violently abused and controlled her in the lead-up to her death. Holly Sanchez, 32, died at a bungalow in Crawley, West Sussex, as a result of multiple injuries suffered during an abusive relationship with 31-year-old Evans.

Evans was arrested over allegations of abuse on April 26, which he denied. He was on bail conditions which said he must not contact Ms Sanchez directly or indirectly, when she was found dead on the floor in his lounge.

Jurors at Brighton Crown Court unanimously found Evans guilty of murder, one count of unlawful wounding, assault occasioning actual bodily harm and controlling and coercive behaviour. He was found not guilty of another count of unlawful wounding. Last month, he was sentenced to life in jail and told he must serve a minimum of 23 years, minus time already spent on remand.

Sussex Police has been ordered to improve its handling of domestic violence cases by watchdog the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) after an investigation into the force’s contact with Ms Sanchez before the murder. The court previously heard police were called out to incidents involving Ms Sanchez and Evans on four occasions in March and April, and Evans was arrested twice before his arrest on April 26. The IOPC said the investigation found no breach of professional standards by individual police officers.

Jurors heard how neighbours called the police on several occasions because of incidents between Evans and Ms Sanchez. On one occasion, a neighbour’s doorbell camera captured Evans dragging Ms Sanchez by the hair through the street, and another neighbour also saw Evans punching her in the face, calling her a “disgusting c***”, while she asked him to stop hurting her.

Haseeb Majid

Haseeb Majid stabbed his love rival to death in a “brutal” attack with a zombie-style knife at a petrol station forecourt. The 22-year-old was convicted of murdering Mohammed Duraab Khan on January 31 at a Texaco garage in Meadow Lane, Nottingham, by inflicting up to 16 wounds in 13 seconds.

Sentencing Majid at Nottingham Crown Court, Judge Steven Coupland handed him a life sentence with a minimum term of 26 years. The jury rejected Majid’s claim that he was acting in self defence and found him guilty after a three-week trial.

The court heard that the defendant “feared violence” from Mr Khan, 26, who had become reacquainted with Majid’s ex-girlfriend which caused “bad blood” between the men. Mr Khan “threatened” his love rival during phone calls and by vandalising his car in the weeks leading up to the attack, the jury was told.

On the evening of the murder, Majid followed Mr Khan, who was a passenger in a black Audi, to the petrol station forecourt, where he approached the car wearing a balaclava. Majid, of Wilford Crescent in The Meadows, Nottingham, claimed he intended to “scare” Mr Khan with the knife at the forecourt, but began the fatal attack when he “lost control” after the victim hit him on his wrist with a steering lock. Prosecution barrister Michael Burrows KC told the court that Majid had acted with “brutal, lethal force”.

Mr Khan’s father, Sarfraz Khan, who sat through the three-week trial, wrote a statement which was read to the court by Mr Burrows, calling his son his “best friend”. He wrote: "Duraab was a remarkable person. A kind soul who always made everyone around him happy. Without him we are shattered."

Ryan Breheny

A man who threatened to kill Wigan MP Lisa Nandy and claimed he was going to attack NHS workers has been jailed. Ryan Breheny, 48, of Old Hall Street, Wigan, pleaded guilty to making a threat to kill, making threatening communications and common assault.

Breheny first called the emergency services just after 6.15pm on June 3 this year, and told the police operator he wanted to make a complaint about the NHS, Bolton Crown Court heard. He then said that he had been “offered an AK-47 and was going to execute everyone in the hospital wearing a uniform”.

He continued to make threats, using the word “execute“ multiple times, referring to the specific weapons he was planning on using. During the call, Breheny referred to chemicals he could get hold of and how easy it was to make a bomb.

Less than an hour later, he sent two threatening emails to Lisa Nandy’s constituency office, threatening to kill the MP. The distressed office manager who opened the emails called police.

READ MORE: Man who threatened to kill Lisa Nandy MP - and greeted police armed with a loaded crossbow

But as one of the officers knocked on the door, he could see Breheny inside the house, beginning to arm a crossbow. Breheny then came to the door with the weapon in his hand. Breheny was arrested and police found more weapons including air rifles, crossbow bolts, a machete, slingshots and a baton.

He admitted sending the emails and making the call to emergency services but denied any intention of carrying out out his threats. Breheny has been jailed for three years and three months.

Gavin Coull

A man who left a young woman paralysed from the neck down after crashing into a car at high speed has been jailed for three years. The 27-year-old woman was left paralysed after the Ford Fiesta she was travelling in was hit from behind by Gavin Coull’s BMW on the southbound lane of the A90 near Ellon, Aberdeenshire in March 2021.

Moments before the impact, Coull, 32, of Fraserburgh, uploaded a dashcam video online that showed his car’s speedometer reaching 100 miles per hour. He was sentenced at Aberdeen Sheriff Court after a jury found him guilty of causing serious injury by dangerous driving and of driving while unfit through drink or drugs.

The court heard how Coull and a fellow passenger were travelling southbound on the dual carriageway late on the evening of March 11. Jurors were shown the dashcam footage Coull uploaded to Snapchat, which was captioned “burning the midnight oil” and highlighted the car’s excessive speed.

The collision caused the Fiesta to smash through crash barriers and tumble onto a grassy embankment off the A90, prosecutors said. The court was told that the driver of the Fiesta also suffered serious injuries. After the crash, a blood sample showed evidence of drugs in Coull’s system.

Alison McKenzie, Procurator Fiscal for Aberdeen, said: "This young woman suffered catastrophic injuries as a direct consequence of Gavin Coull’s dangerous driving. In a split second, she was deprived of the normal and rich life she was entitled to expect."

Faseh Sajid

A young man has been jailed for sharing “horrific” beheading videos glorifying the so-called Islamic State (IS) terrorist group on an encrypted Telegram chat group. Faseh Sajid was 18 when he began posting videos featuring armed IS fighters and mass execution, the Old Bailey was told.

The material was uncovered on his iPhone after police searched the home he shared with his mother in Speedwell, Bristol, on November 21 2022. The court heard one of the groups the defendant posted material on had nearly 4,000 members, including some with sympathies for IS.

Sajid, now aged 21, insisted he had not intended that anyone would be encouraged to prepare or instigate acts of terrorism, but a jury found him guilty of five of the charges of dissiminating terrorist publications.

In mitigation, his barrister Philip Stott said Sajid’s “fixation” with “gore videos” should be seen in the context of his young age and diagnosis autism spectrum disorder. Even though Sajid was “intelligent and thoughtful”, his crimes displayed a “lack of maturity”, Mr Stott said.

A judge at the Old Bailey jailed Sajid for three years and nine months with a further year on extended licence. He said the defendant’s posting of videos depicting beheadings and executions went beyond his “infatuation” with gore videos.

Peter Stanley

A man has been jailed for 20 months for posting “horrific” videos of baby monkeys being tortured for entertainment. Peter Stanley posted three videos showing the torture of baby long-tailed macaque monkeys on a private Facebook site, since shut down, linked to the intentional harm of animals for entertainment.

The 43-year-old posted videos along with comments, including: “A fave of mine this one.” But the videos were spotted by an animal welfare group and the Facebook user ID was given to police who traced Stanley and raided his home.

Detectives seized a mobile phone revealing 75 videos of monkeys being tortured. Stanley was also found to have been searching terms on the internet such as: “How to tell if a baby monkey is distressed” and “Horse Porn”.

READ MORE: Man, 42, jailed for posting baby monkey torture video online

After his arrest on March 26 this year, he told police he had become aware of these videos and wanted to know just how bad they were so joined a Facebook group, the rules of which were that members had to post three videos to show they would not report the group to authorities. He did not himself make the videos or harm animals directly.

Stanley, of Dovecote Avenue, Dovecote, Liverpool, admitted three counts of publishing obscene material, before he was jailed at Liverpool Crown Court.

Robert Holden

A “depraved and selfish” former councillor who filmed 28 women in bathrooms and bedrooms using hidden cameras over a period of almost 15 years has been jailed for six years and two months. Bradford Crown Court heard emotional statements from many of the women targeted by Robert Holden, 51, describing how his “perverted fetish” had left them feeling “violated, disgusted and mortified” and, in many cases, had completely wrecked their lives.

Judge Sophie McKone heard how an investigation uncovered hundreds of recordings of an intimate nature, including of women taking showers, engaged in sexual activity, on the toilet and getting undressed. Some women had been recorded over lengthy periods – one for more than 12 years.

Going through each victim’s experience in turn, the judge said of one: “You recorded her in virtually every act she was doing, including sexual acts.” One women was recorded “on countless occasions”, sometimes with her very young daughter, and police later found that her mother had also been filmed by Holden, who was a Conservative and, later, independent member of Calderdale Council. Another victim was just 16 at the time he filmed her showering.

The judge noted how Holden, who ran an IT business, kept huge numbers of these recordings on his devices, neatly labelled in files. Judge McKone said Holden even turned to some of the women involved for comfort after he was arrested and attempted suicide, only for them to find out later that he had filmed them too.

She said: “This was voyeurism on a vast scale – not just in terms of the number of victims, or the length of time it went on for, but in terms of the number of times you watched a particular victim.” Judge McKone said: “It’s hard to think of a worse breach of trust.”

Thomas Weller

A social worker was described as a “monster” as he was jailed for sexually messaging two young teenagers on Snapchat and accessing records of another teenager he had a relationship with. Thomas Weller, 33, was sentenced to 34 months in prison after admitting sending “truly revolting” explicit texts and looking up social work records of another young woman he wanted to renew communication with. His sexual communication was not connected to his role as a West Sussex social worker, the court heard.

The mother of a 13-year-old girl who exchanged nearly 300 messages with Weller, who posed as a 20-year-old man, said she thinks her daughter had been “scarred for life” and has lost trust in everyone. Sentencing him, Judge Christine Laing KC, said: “You were working in children’s services, you knew better than anybody else how vulnerable young children can be and they were children.”

The court heard how the 13-year-old repeatedly told him her age and on one occasion he replied “idc” – meaning “I don’t care”. In a victim impact statement read to court, her mother said: “She has lost trust in social services, she has lost trust in men, she seems angry when she talks to me. Her safe space is her bedroom and now he’s like a ghost who floats around in there.”

The social worker also exchanged more than 200 Snapchat messages with a 15-year-old boy and offered for him to come to his home but it was only the boy’s reluctance that stopped it going ahead. In addition, the court heard how Weller accessed social work records on two dates of a young woman he had a brief relationship with, and was trying to renew contact.

Weller, of Horsham, pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual communication with a child and misconduct in public office in July this year. Defending Weller, Oliver Kirk said he suffers from mental disorders which relate to his offending, and that he is “full of remorse” and that on reflection his actions go against his inner moral compass. Weller was sentenced to 34 months in custody and will be on the sex offender’s register for seven years.