Teen planned Southport-style knife massacre at dance school

Teen terror shock as court hears boy, 17, plotted Southport Style mass knife rampage at Dance School, after sharing bomb manuals, praising child killer, and scoping targets across South Wales.

A 17-year-old boy appeared in court accused of plotting a knife attack modelled on the Southport dance studio killings, after expressing admiration for Axel Rudakubana and compiling a list of potential targets, including a local dance school and the much-anticipated Oasis reunion concert in Cardiff.

The youth, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was living with his parents in a small village near Cwmbran, South Wales, when police became aware of his activity earlier this year. Prosecutors told Westminster Magistrates’ Court that the teenager had engaged in sustained online discussions in which he referenced Rudakubana’s 2023 attack — in which three young girls were murdered during a Taylor Swift-themed dance class — and had spoken of copying the method.

On 19 April, in a chat with a peer over a messaging app, he shared an image of a large combat-style knife listed for sale online, accompanied by the message: “Would this work?” Nine days later, police examining his phone discovered a digital note titled “places to attack”, which included a screenshot of a dance school near his home, along with walking directions to the premises.

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GPS data retrieved from the device placed him in close proximity to the school just days earlier. Further analysis revealed he had also looked into his own secondary school as a possible target and had made references to launching an attack at the first Oasis reunion gig, scheduled to take place in Cardiff.

Prosecutors said the youth had openly praised Rudakubana in Snapchat conversations and even claimed to have attempted to manufacture ricin, a lethal toxin also associated with the Southport killings. He later denied having done so in police interviews and said the claim had not been true.

The investigation was triggered when a peer who had been communicating with the boy on Snapchat contacted the authorities, concerned by the content of their exchanges. That initial report was followed by a second, after the youth disclosed his intentions to a counsellor during a scheduled session on 2 June.

The court was told that during that meeting, he admitted he had been planning to carry out a Rudakubana-style attack. Shortly afterwards, at around 10.30am that same morning, he transferred a known al-Qaeda training manual between two mobile phones.