Stuart Stephens has today described the heartbreak and grief he and his family, from Reading, Berkshire, suffered following the murder of his 13-year-old son Olly
A dad has described the moment at finding his teenage son lifeless following his murder.
Stuart Stephens recalled the heartbreak of losing 13-year-old Olly, who was ambushed and stabbed by two teenage boys in a park. Stuart dashed to the scene after being alerted of the horror by Olly’s friend — but, by then, it was too late. Despite the best efforts of paramedics, the youngster was pronounced dead.
The mean age of the children and young people under 18 killed between 2019 and 2024 was 14.4 years, a study has found. The analysis of the English National Child Mortality Database by Bristol Medical School, the first national analysis of its kind, determined that there were 36 knife deaths in those 17 and under in 2023-24, up from 21 in 2019-20.
Olly was killed in January 2021 in the park yards from his home in Reading, Berkshire. Reacting to the new data, his dad said this week: “One (teenage murder victim) is one too many.”
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Recalling the chaos Stuart was faced upon his arrival at Bugs Bottom field, near his home, the dad said: “They (emergency services) were doing all they could. But I felt his hand and I knew he was gone.”
The two boys were each convicted of murder and sentenced to a minimum of 12 and 13 years’ imprisonment. A girl, who lured Olly to the park, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to be detained in a Young Offender Institution for three years and two months, which was later increased on appeal.
Since then, Stuart and his wife, Amanda, have channelled their grief into campaigning for better accountability for the social media companies whose platforms were used to plan their son’s murder. The police investigation found the killers had exchanged messages in the days beforehand in which they showed hostility to Olly. Boys linked to the case were sharing images of knives and of youths attacking each other.
“We didn’t understand what social media was capable of because we assumed there was accountability. We need to break the cycle. All these parents are bereaved because of social media,” Stuart continued.
“These companies should be protecting children. Those algorithms should not be feeding harmful content to anyone under the age of 16. I would prefer if children didn’t have social media until they’re 18, because their brains aren’t developed for what they see. Once a child has seen that stuff you can’t unsee it. But this is what we can’t get these politicians to understand.”
The Times reports bereaved parents, such as Stuart, also want knives to be manufactured without pointed tips. However, Professor Lawrence Sherman, a former Metropolitan Police chief scientific officer, says that the focus should instead be on collating granular data on exactly where most knife crime occurs and concentrating patrols in those areas.
Prof Sherman, chair of the Cambridge Centre for Evidence-Based Policing, was the co-author of a study which concluded that returning to 2008-11 levels of stop and search by police would lead to 30 fewer knife murders each year.
