Axel Rudakubana, the 18-year-old who murdered three young girls in Southport last July, purchased a machete and other weapons from The Range store, it has emerged. The killer also bought equipment to make the lethal poison ricin on Amazon at least two years before the attack, according to newly revealed details.
Rudakubana used security software to hide his identity when ordering knives from Amazon in the days before the attack on a Taylor Swift-themed dance class on 29 July. Six minutes before leaving his home, he searched for a video of the Sydney church stabbing in which a bishop was attacked during a livestreamed sermon.
The teenager had been referred three times to the Prevent anti-radicalisation programme – in 2019 and twice in 2021 – including once due to concerns about his potential interest in school massacres. He was also known to Lancashire Constabulary, with several interactions between October 2019 and May 2022, including five calls from his family about his behaviour.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the failure of authorities to stop Rudakubana “frankly leaps off the page” and pledged a full public inquiry. Rudakubana pleaded guilty to murdering Bebe King, six, Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and attempting to kill eight other children and two adults.
During the attack, Rudakubana entered the dance studio at 11.45am, 15 minutes before parents were due to collect their children. Without speaking, he grabbed the nearest girl and stabbed her, then systematically attacked others. Police described it as “a planned and premeditated attempt to commit mass murder”.
At his home, detectives found a cache of weapons including a machete, knives, arrows, and ricin-making materials. His internet history showed “an obsession with extreme violence”, including material on Nazi Germany, Chechnya, and the Rwanda genocide. He had also downloaded an academic study on Al-Qaida in 2021.
