A TEENAGE survivor of Axel Rudakubana’s murderous rampage in a Southport dance class has described the moment she first saw the killer – saying he looked “possessed”.
The girl, who was 13 at the time, said he “didn’t look human” and that she knew from his eyes that he “wanted to kill us all” as he stabbed the girl in front of her multiple times.
Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Alice da Silva Aguiar (left to right) were brutally murdered during a Taylor Swift themed dance classAFP
Axel Rudakubana was 17 years old when he murdered three little girls
PARudakubana received a 52-year sentence in January[/caption]
She was stabbed in the back and the arm, but managed to escape the room in the Hart Space centre along with her nine-year-old sister.
She told the new Channel 4 documentary One Day In Southport: “My vision was going blurry and I ran across to this guy and I said to him: ‘I’ve been stabbed, I think I’m dying.’
“I was struggling to breathe, and I saw my sister there and she was saying, ‘Please don’t die, please don’t die’.”
The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was at the Taylor Swift-themed dance and yoga workshop last July to take pictures for the teacher’s social media.
Most of the other attendees were girls aged six to 10, including her sister’s close friend, Alice da Silva Aguiar.
Tragically, nine-year-old Alice was one of three girls who lost their lives in the attacks, as well as Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven.
Eight more children and two adults – including the yoga teacher, Leanne Lucas, 36 – were treated in hospital for their injuries.
The girl’s parents also speak in the documentary, and describe the horrific moment they realised their children had been involved in the attack.
The father, who rushed straight to the Hart Space, recalled: “I saw one of the people there carrying a child in his arms.
“And then as soon as I saw that I ran straight into that building and up those stairs and that’s when I was confronted with sights and smells I never want to relive.”
The mother added: “My husband phones me and says you need to get here now, the kids have been stabbed.
GettyMembers of the community, family and friends blew bubbles as people gathered to mourn victims of the Southport attack at a vigil[/caption]
Police found weapons in Rudakubana’s home after he attacked children at The Hart Space in SouthportPA
“There were just ambulances and fire engines everywhere and there was blood all over the floor and the cars.
“I didn’t want to look, I didn’t want to know it was my child.”
The knifeman had inflicted life-threatening injuries on their eldest daughter, puncturing her spine.
Her father described it looking like “her muscles had been turned inside out”.
But the girl had also saved the lives of some of the other children, by leading them down the stairs to safety.
She said: “I saw some of the girls huddling round the stairs looking like they didn’t know what to do, so I started screaming at them to run and get themselves down the stairs.
“They got themselves out of the building and I am so proud of every single one of them.”
I was struggling to breathe, and I saw my sister there and she was saying, ‘please don’t die, please don’t die’
Southport Survivor
The documentary also explores how the appalling attacks triggered ten days of mob violence across the UK.
With the police initially refusing to name the attacker, online speculation filled the vacuum and falsely identified the killer as a Muslim and an illegal immigrant.
A raging mob attempted to burn down Southport mosque, and were barely held back by police who also found themselves under attack.
Ibrahim Hussein, imam of the mosque, described being trapped inside while thugs threw missiles and set the building on fire.
He said: “The whole place was shaking and between me and them was only one PVC door. One kick and they would be inside.
“The police tried to hold them back but smoke was coming through and it was soon covering the whole office.
“I had young lads in here, with young families, and some of them broke down and were crying.”
The mosque had absolutely no connection to the killer. The imam added: “Obviously we were just as devastated as anybody else [by the attacks] because in the Muslim community family is everything. But social media took over.”
‘Pressure cooker’
Appalling attacks triggered ten days of mob violence across the UKGetty Images
Ibrahim Hussein described being trapped inside Southport mosque while thugs threw missiles and set the building on firePA Wire
A raging mob attempted to burn down Southport mosqueJames Glossop
When the killer was named as 17-year-old Axel Rudakubana, a Cardiff-born son of Rwandan Christian parents, it did nothing to stem the anger and violence that was now spreading across the country.
The documentary shows shocking footage from the 27 towns and cities where riots erupted, with mobs attacking migrant hotels, fighting running battles with police and in Middlesborough, indiscriminately smashing windows.
But some of those involved in the demonstrations tell the documentary it was not about race.
Dean Neil, a bearded political activist and bricklayer, claimed: “If you’re white, straight and working-class, you’re getting hammered”.
He said at the first demonstration in central London, he was surrounded by “people you expect to see in Marks and Spencer doing their shopping”.
Wendell Daniel, who is black and works as a videographer for the Far Right leader Tommy Robinson, agrees the main flash point is class.
He said: “It was a pressure cooker that was building and building and it was ready to explode.
“Then when Southport happened, boom. I have never seen people so angry.”
However, the film shows some of the most shocking violence directed at migrant hotels.
Harry Jackson, a call centre worker and YouTuber from Hull, where the Royal Hotel which houses asylum seekers was attacked, said: “England is a white Christian English nation and I think it should stay that way.
It was a pressure cooker that was building and building and it was ready to explode. Then when Southport happened, boom. I have never seen people so angry
Wendell Daniel
“I don’t think it’s controversial or racist to say that. The only way for the English people to take back control of their government and economy… is by force.”
Shocking footage shows a huge mob in the town attempting to drag a group of Romanian cousins from their car to beat them up.
One of the Romanians tells the documentary he thought he was going to be killed.
He added: “Foreigners come to work and mind their business, people who are from this country, destroy it.”
Murad, an asylum seeker from central Asia, found himself under attack at a migrant hotel in Rotherham where thugs threw bricks at the windows, stormed the corridors and set fires.
He said: “It’s both wonderful and awful in England. You look after us but you hate us.”
In the aftermath of the riots police made 1,800 arrests and rioters sentences now total more than 1,000 hours.
But Weyman Bennett, secretary of campaigning organisation Stand Up To Racism and a veteran of three decades of anti-fascist street protests, says that the riots demonstrated a dangerously widespread dissatisfaction.
He said: “People are rightfully angry but they’re blaming the wrong people. Immigration is used as an explanation for everything.”
Weyman also believes that we’re seeing a tidal shift in politics and the kinds of people who attend “far right” rallies.
He said: “This time they involved a periphery of angry people who were not fascists.
“There’s a populist feeling that ‘no-one’s listening to us’ and actually the far-right could end up being the cheerleaders of that, and that’s the danger.”
Lasting impact
The teenage survivor and her family tell the documentary they reject the politicisation of the Southport attacks.
Asked whether it bothers her that the person who attacked her daughter was the son of immigrants, the mother said: “I choose not to make that a reason.
There were just ambulances and fire engines everywhere and there was blood all over the floor and the cars. I didn’t want to look, I didn’t want to know it was my child
Mother of Southport Survivor
“At the time we didn’t feel any anger, we just wanted to hold everyone close and dear and just wanted to feel love and compassion, nothing more.”
The girl says she is still living with the consequences of being stabbed, having to use a special chair at school to ease the pain on her scars and taking time out of lessons when she suffers debilitating flashbacks.
But she condemns the violence of protesters who claimed to be acting in the name of the Southport victims.
She said: “I didn’t think the rioting needed to happen. It didn’t represent me at all.”
One Day in Southport airs on Channel 4 tomorrow (Thursday 24 July) at 9pm.
Elsie Dot Stancombe was a devoted ‘Swiftie’ who loved to dancePA Wire
PAAlice da Silva Aguiar died from her injuries in hospital a day after the attack[/caption]
Bebe King was the youngest girl killed by RudakubanaAP
The sea of floral tributes to the tragic victims on Maple Street, SouthportPA Wire
The horse-drawn hearse outside a celebration of Elsie Dot Stancombe at St John’s Church, In August, 2024Getty Images
A handout image released by Merseyside Police shows a replica of the knife used in the attack by RudakubanaGetty Images Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
