Current:Home > Contact2 children dead and 11 people injured in stabbing rampage at a dance class in England, police say -MoneyTrend
2 children dead and 11 people injured in stabbing rampage at a dance class in England, police say
View
Date:2025-04-18 02:21:16
LONDON (AP) — A teenage boy with a knife attacked a children’s dance and yoga class in northwest England on Monday, killing two children and wounding 11 other people in a “ferocious” rampage that sent bloodied children running into a street to escape the horror, police and witnesses said.
A 17-year-old boy was arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder in the attack in Southport, a seaside town near Liverpool, Merseyside Police said. The motive was not clear, but police said detectives were not treating the attack as terror-related.
Nine children were wounded, six of them in critical condition. Two wounded adults who tried to protect them also were in critical condition, police said.
“We believe the adults who were injured were bravely trying to protect the children who were being attacked,” Police Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said.
The Taylor Swift-themed workshop was held on the first week of school vacation for children aged about 6 to 11. An advertisement for the two-hour session promised yoga, dance and bracelet making.
Witnesses described hearing blood-curdling screams and seeing children covered in blood.
“They were in the road, running from the nursery,” said Bare Varathan, who owns a shop nearby. “They had been stabbed, here, here, here, everywhere,” indicating neck, back and chest.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the attack “horrendous and deeply shocking.”
Merseyside Police said officers were called at about noon to an address in Southport, a seaside town of about 100,000 people near Liverpool. It called it a “major incident” but said there was no wider threat to the public.
“When they arrived they were shocked to find that multiple people, many of whom were children, had been subjected to a ferocious attack and had suffered serious injuries,” Kennedy said.
Colin Parry, an auto body shop owner, said most of the stabbing victims appeared to be young girls.
“The mothers are coming here now and screaming,” Parry said. “It is like a scene from a horror movie. ... It’s like something from America, not like sunny Southport.”
The suspect, who has not been identified, lived in a village about 5 miles (8 kilometers) from the site of the attack, police said. He was originally from Cardiff, Wales.
Ryan Carney, who lives with his mother in the street, said his mother saw emergency workers carrying children “covered in red, covered in blood. She said she could see the stab wounds in the backs of the children.”
“All this stuff never really happens around here,” he said. “You hear of it, stabbings and stuff like that in major cities, your Manchesters, your Londons. This is sunny Southport. That’s what people call it. The sun’s out. It’s a lovely place to be.”
Britain’s worst attack on children occurred in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot 16 kindergarten pupils and their teacher dead in a school gymnasium in Dunblane, Scotland. The U.K. subsequently banned the private ownership of almost all handguns.
Mass shootings and murders with firearms are rare in Britain, where knives were used in about 40% of homicides in the year to March 2023. Several headline-grabbing attacks and a recent rise in knife crime have stoked anxieties and led to calls for the government to do more to clamp down on bladed weapons.
veryGood! (9619)
Related
- Nearly half of US teens are online ‘constantly,’ Pew report finds
- U.S. Marine returns home to surprise parents, who've never seen him in uniform
- Oscar nominations are Tuesday morning. Expect a big day for ‘Oppenheimer,’ ‘Barbie’
- US Supreme Court won’t overrule federal judges’ order to redraw Detroit legislative seats
- See you latte: Starbucks plans to cut 30% of its menu
- The Razzie nominations are out. Here's who's up for worst actor and actress.
- Video shows small asteroid burning up as it zooms through skies over eastern Germany
- Tech CEO Sanjay Shah Dead at 56 After Freak Accident at Company Party
- At site of suspected mass killings, Syrians recall horrors, hope for answers
- Alabama calls nitrogen execution method ‘painless’ and ‘humane,’ but critics raise doubts
Ranking
- Questlove charts 50 years of SNL musical hits (and misses)
- Ticket prices for AFC, NFC championship game: Cost to see Chiefs vs. Ravens, Lions vs. 49ers
- Chinese state media say 20 people dead and 24 missing after landslide
- A college student fell asleep on the train. She woke up hours later trapped inside.
- Intel's stock did something it hasn't done since 2022
- The FAA says airlines should check the door plugs on another model of Boeing plane
- Oilers sign Corey Perry less than two months after Blackhawks terminated his contract
- Mexico demands investigation into US military-grade weapons being used by drug cartels
Recommendation
2025 'Doomsday Clock': This is how close we are to self
Reese Witherspoon responds to concerns over her eating snow: 'You only live once'
US targets Iraqi airline Fly Baghdad, its CEO and Hamas cryptocurrency financiers for sanctions
Brooks and Dunn concerts: REBOOT Tour schedule released with 20 dates in US, Canada
Taylor Swift makes surprise visit to Kansas City children’s hospital
Burton Wilde: Four Techniques for Securely Investing in Cryptocurrencies.
Former West Virginia health official pleads guilty in COVID-19 payment investigation
Senators are racing to finish work on a border deal as aid to Ukraine hangs in the balance