A 14-year-old girl has been found guilty of attempted murder at Swansea Crown Court after attacking two teachers and another pupil at a school in Ammanford, south Wales, in April last year.
Ysgol Dyffryn Aman – also known as Amman Valley school – went into lockdown after teachers Fiona Elias and Liz Hopkin, and a student, were stabbed by a pupil. The “out-of-control” teen previously admitted the attacks but denied attempted murder. In January, Swansea Crown Court heard that another pupil told the police she had overheard the girl saying she was going to do “something stupid” which would involve Mrs Elias.
The defendant was also found to have taken a knife to class every day – after being bullied out of her last school. The schoolgirl smuggled the fold-up multitool knife in the cargo pants she wore instead of normal school uniform. She secretly took the Swiss Army-style knife into school as an “instinct thing” – and claimed didn’t intend on hurting anyone.
The teen girl started late at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman in Year 8 when she was 12 years old with her father bringing her up alone after her mother left home. She had moved to the school after previously being bullied in her former school – and was a pupil in Year 9 when the attack took place.
The “troubled” and “unhappy” child lived with her father and older brother. But her brother, 15, was arrested for making threats with a BB gun just hours after his sister was arrested for the alleged stabbing rampage. Her father was the main carer as her mother left when she was young, but she would see her occasionally.
The teen said she was bullied and would often self-harm: “I was quite anxious, scared, all the time. During school, after school, 24/7.” She was even found with a knife in her school bag back in September 2023 by assistant head Mrs Fiona Elias – and she was excluded. But her father won a plea for her to be allowed back.
Her father would check her bag everyday to allow her back to school, so she would put the multi-tool in her trousers instead. The teen told how that she would use the knife to self-harm. She told the jury she did not like Ms Elias, and said she was “rude” towards her teacher, but never intended to harm her.
She said she “couldn’t remember” telling a pupil she wanted to stab Ms Elias a week before the attack. She stabbed assistant headteacher Fiona Elias, 48, and Liz Hopkin, 53, and another teenager repeatedly with a fishing blade while allegedly shouting: “I’ll f***ing kill you.”
Mrs Elias and Mrs Hopkin both feared they were going to die in the attack after confronting the girl for trying to access a hall at the school before asking what was in her pocket. The girl allegedly said: “Do you want to see what’s in my pocket?” before pulling out the multi-tool with a silver blade and shouting “I’m going to f***ing kill you”.
Prosecutor Hughes said the girl had “sinister eyes” during the attack and that Mrs Elias was the “primary focus” who she stabbed in the arm repeatedly. Mr Hughes said special educational needs teacher Mrs Hopkin was injured as she tried to stop the girl stabbing her colleague. She then allegedly targeted a nearby pupil, stabbing the her in the upper torso and leg while saying “I’m going to f***ing kill you” before being pulled off.
Dyfed Powys Police were called to the school and the teenager – with marks and scratched on her arms – was detained in a classroom before officers arrived and later arrested her following the alleged attacks at the 1,500-pupil school. Mr Hughes described the attack which happened at around 11.15am as a “serious episode of violence”.
Mrs Elias had stab and puncture wounds to her arms and to a thumb, and the pupil had wounds to her back and lesser injuries to her legs. Mrs Hopkin had stab wounds to her leg, a wound to the rear of the left side of the chest, and a stab wound at the top of the neck into the trapezius muscle. All three alleged victims were taken to hospital for treatment and later released to recover at home.
She added: “I used to say stuff like ‘I hate her’, and never that I wanted her dead. The girl said she did not know Mrs Hopkin before the stabbing and did not have any intention to hurt her or deliberately target her neck during the attack. The teenager and the pupil she attacked did not get on, as there had been a “petty argument” a few months before – but the pair were fine the day after.
They used to say “Hi” to each other when they passed in school, so the pupil didn’t understand why they had been targeted in the attack. The teen previously said that she used to write and draw to express herself as she didn’t feel comfortable talking to people – but meant no harm by it.
The notebook and drawings that were found belonging to the girl stated words and phrases of killing and death – with references to “burning” a person and cutting their “mouth and eyes to death.” Phrases like “crime of a lifetime”, wanting to do “something humans are not supposed to do”, and “Why do I want to kill others as much as I want to kill myself?” were found in the notebook.
Mr Hughes said: “You may not think it’s uncommon for a teenager to write dark thoughts. But it’s a world of difference, ladies and gentlemen, to carry out those thoughts and actually doing it.”
Caroline Rees KC, defending, asked the jurors to see the written material in the context of a “deeply unhappy” teenage girl and to “reject what the prosecution say that they show an intent to kill.” She described the girl as a “troubled” and “unhappy” child who “hasn’t tried to suggest that anything she did that day was justified.”
Ms Rees told the jury if the girl intended to kill, why did she pick a location where others could intervene. “She did not seek to take them somewhere private. She did not plan a scenario where she could act without being stopped,” Ms Rees said.
Ms Rees said the girl “carried a knife daily” as a means of self-harm not as a sign of intent to kill. “She wasn’t a child who really had people to turn to,” Ms Rees said. “Instead, she tended to hide herself away, to isolate, and she drew.” She said the attack itself was “frantic” and “fast” – and lasted just over three minutes.
She described the girl as a “sad”, “immature”, “angry”, and “out-of-control teenager” who doesn’t remember saying the phrase “I’m going to kill you.” The teenager didn’t remember much of the attack, and realised the seriousness of what she had done when she was arrested and put in the back of a police van.
When asked how she felt harming the two staff members and pupils that day, she said: “It just doesn’t sound like me. It’s kind of hard to forget, but also hard to remember, I suppose I’m sorry.” Referring to her attack on the pupil, she said: “I remember being pulled back into a corner and her calling me a psychopath. I said ‘It’s your fault’, very, very quietly. I remember being very exhausted.”
The teen added her “heart felt like it was burning,” when she saw one of the three being taken away on a stretcher. She explained that she didn’t remember “much of that conversation” in the police van where she said “oopsies” and asked “are they dead?”.
The teen said she regretted the way she behaved that day, adding: “It was really out of character.”
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