A High Court judge has rejected a media request to publicly name two 12-year-old boys who murdered a stranger in a machete attack in Wolverhampton.
Mrs Justice Tipples said the welfare of the schooboys, who both face a mandatory life sentence for killing 19-year-old Shawn Seesahai, outweighed the wider public interest and open justice principles.a skull fracture when he was struck repeatedly on playing fields at Stowlawn, in Bilston, on November 13 last year after a shoulder barging.
But after a two-day application hearing Mrs Justice Tipples, sitting at Nottingham Crown Court, said she had accepted evidence contained in pre-sentence reports that naming the boys would have a detremental impact on their welfare., told the court the facts of the killing – which “took place in not much more than a minute” – were “of course shocking, particularly given the very young age of the defendants”.
The judge also accepted a statement in a pre-sentence report which said naming the other youth was likely to increase the likelihood of negative attention within the custodial setting. He told the court: “This point is squarely present in this case, which has attracted local concern and national revulsion.Naming the boys would also enable the media to investigate the possibility of institutional failures.
Mr Lewis, representing the boy who has turned 13 since his conviction, urged the court to focus on the facts of Mr Seesahai’s killing rather than “siren calls” relating to abstract principles from previous cases.
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