The senior detective who investigated the dance party stabbing said Axel Rudakubana’s parents “must have known” about his weapons’ possession
15:33, 23 Sep 2025Updated 15:48, 23 Sep 2025
CCTV of Axel Rudakubana getting out of a taxi outside his home on Old School Close in Banks a week before the murders of Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Alice da Silva Aguiar(Image: Merseyside Police)
Police searched through close to 160,000 messages from the Southport killer’s parents to see if they sympathised with his obsession with violence. The ongoing Southport Inquiry heard today, Tuesday, that a significant part of the police’s investigations into mass murderer Axel Rudakubana focused on his obsession with violent material, as well as if his parents shared the same interest.
Detective chief inspector Jason Pye, who led the force’s probe, told the inquiry that the killer’s parents, Alphonse Rudakubana and Laetitia Muzayire, “must have known” about his possession of weapons including machetes and knives, but nothing was found “to suggest at all that they sympathised with him”.
Rudakubana murdered Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Bebe King, six, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, when he targeted a Taylor Swift-themed dance party on July 29 last year. He also badly injured eight other children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, as well as teacher and party organiser Leanne Lucas and local businessman John Hayes.
The Southport Inquiry has heard how Rudakubana, who is only being referred to as AR during proceedings, made more than a dozen online orders for weapons over the course of at least two years. Rudakubana’s parents are believed to have been aware of what the orders were, as on at least one occasion, his dad confiscated the package and hid it away.
Dating back to at least 2019, Rudakubana appeared to have an interest in knives. Apart from details about his online purchases, the inquiry has heard he told Childline he regularly carried them to school, took a knife into his former school, The Range, to carry out a revenge attack of someone he deemed to be a bully, and was caught on a bus by police officers with a stolen kitchen knife.
The inquiry has also heard how the killer’s parents had also been advised by Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) to remove and secure all knives from the property.
Rudakubana’s dad also begged a taxi driver to not take his son back to his former school just a week before the mass stabbing in Southport because he feared his son was armed and was planning an attack. However, although he “suspected AR had a weapon on him that day”, he did not call the police.
Nicholas Moss KC asked DCI Pye: “Would this be right, that in general terms, AR’s parents did have some knowledge of his possession of bladed items?” The officer confirmed yes.
Merseyside Police senior investigating officer detective chief inspector Jason Pye(Image: Colin Lane)
Mr Moss added: “This inquiry will explore the extent of AR’s parents’ knowledge and the adequacy of steps that they took in response. But did you in the investigation find any evidence at all that AR’s parents in any form sympathised with violent attacks or had that mindset?”
DCI Pye told the inquiry that the probe had not uncovered any sympathy towards their son’s views. Mr Moss added: “And in terms of online activity, AR’s fascination, interest in torture, extreme violence, matters of that kind, did you find any evidence across the family devices of any evidence at all that AR’s parents shared an interest in extreme violence?”
The investigating officer added: “We didn’t. We obtained hundreds of thousands of messages, more or less from the mother’s phone, but there was nothing to suggest that they shared that level of violence at all.” The officer later clarified that the force had gained access to 159,000 messages, many of them in a Rwandan language.
The inquiry has heard that a “significant” theme of the proceedings will be Rudakubana’s relation with his family, in particular his behaviour in the week before the attack and what their awareness was of the weapon-obsessed teen’s online orders.
During his opening to the inquiry, Mr Moss said: “It may be said to be apparent that AR’s parents were aware of…aspects of AR’s conduct that might have been expected to give rise to a concern.”
During Tuesday’s proceedings, DCI Pye said investigators found PDF documents on Rudakubana’s devices relating to “violence, an interest in religion and conflict, an interest in Nazi Germany, Chechnya, genocide, punishment dealt to slave rebels, the Zulu war and the fight against ISIS”.
Axel Rudakubana in the back of the taxi on the way to the Southport attack(Image: Merseyside Police)
A number of JPEG images were also found which included the slavery of women, anti-Islamic material, anti-Semitic material, extreme violence including torture, bodies of the deceased following atrocities, Nazi era imagery and one image of the Twin Towers.
The inquiry heard last week how Rudakubana had “specifically targeted women and girls” during his attack. It is likely, although not confirmed, he saw details about the event, including the address and the age bracket of attending girls, on Instagram.
Mr Moss asked DCI Pye if there was any evidence that Rudakubana was motivated by “any ideological cause, whether political, religious or racial?” The officer said nothing was found, with Mr Moss instead telling the inquiry that Rudakubana was a young man “who had a fascination with violence and inappropriate material”.
The killer was jailed for life with a minimum term of 52 years in January at Liverpool Crown Court, after admitting the “sadistic” murders and attempted murders.
Mr Moss previously said the proceedings would be a “definitive account” of the attack, the background and the killer’s involvement with state agencies, including police, schools and social services.
Sir Adrian Fulford, chairman of the inquiry, has promised to do everything “humanly possible” to answer the questions of bereaved families and victims. He added: “What occurred on that day has made it critically necessary, moreover, to identify all the changes that need to be implemented in order to ensure, as best as our society is able, that there is no repetition.”
The first phase of the inquiry, which is expected to run until November, continues.