The tragic death of Ava White highlights how far Liverpool has to come in its battle against violent crime according to Merseyside's Police and Crime Commissioner.
A jury took just two hours and eight minutes to deliver a guilty verdict in relation to a charge of murder against the 14-year-old boy who stabbed Ava in the neck in Liverpool city centre just before Christmas last year. Her killer, Boy A, from South Liverpool, who cannot be named for legal reasons, stabbed the Year 8 Notre Dame Catholic College pupil with a flick knife after an argument about him filming her on Snapchat. Prosecutors alleged the teen laughed and ran away.
Emily Spurrell, Merseyside Police and Crime Commissioner, told the ECHO the case shone a light on how far the city has to come to tackle violent crime and put an end to tragic events like Ava’s death. Addressing her reaction to the guilty verdict, Mrs Spurell said: “Mostly it was just thinking about the family and friends, it was such a traumatic incident and you saw the way the whole city came out and responded to it because it’s never nice when something like this happens, but when it’s a 12-year-old girl, everyone’s looking at their own children and thinking it could have been them.
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“I think in some ways I hope it offered some kind of closure or comfort that they’ve got that result. I think as well it’s really sad that he was a kid himself (Boy A) and the messaging we need to get out of this now is the dangers of carrying a knife and what you think might be a split second decision might lead to somebody losing their life.
“There’s work we’re doing to really try and hammer that message home, particularly to young people, but it’s a really sad incident that highlights how much work we’ve still got to do with it.” Ava’s killer will be sentenced in July and just days after the verdict was handed down, three teenagers were arrested after a 14-year-old boy was knifed in the armpit, also in the city centre.
The teenager was stabbed after getting into a row with a gang on the number 80 bus. The victim and the gang alighted on Hanover Street and went their separate ways, however the victim was then reportedly approached by the gang and stabbed.
Police officers were then called to Argyle Street, at around 7.10pm on Wednesday, May 25, where the 14-year-old was attacked. Two 15-year-olds and a 17-year-old, from Anfield, Litherland and Crosby were found and arrested.
During a scrutiny meeting of senior officers held by Mrs Spurrell in March, Assistant Chief Constable (ACC) of Merseyside Police, Jon Roy, said Ava’s death made officers “double” their efforts in relation to violent and knife-related crime. Mrs Spurrell said work was being done to continue to drive down these incidents.
She said: “When you look at the statistics, the number of knife crime incidents have gone down, we’re seeing really positive trajectories in terms of those kinds of incidents, the numbers are actually decreasing but I think because we’ve had quite a number of high profile and particularly tragic ones, like with Ava, I think there’s still this perception that there is this awful knife crime happening.
“I don’t think it’s on the scale it was previously and I think what the force are doing is working but obviously one is too many so there’s definitely more to be done. There’s a huge amount of work being done through the violence reduction partnership because there’s an acknowledgement that the police can’t do this by themselves.
“Yes they investigate it and try and bring offenders to justice but we need to get much further upstream and that’s a lot of the work the partnership are trying to do in terms of the public health approach, identifying why young people are being drawn into criminality, why they’re feeling the need to carry a knife. I think they’re doing everything they can possibly do with the resources available to them.”
