The life of one of Brianna Ghey’s killers Eddie Ratcliffe has been detailed during a four-week trial from his normal family life to “dark fantasies”.
Jurors at Manchester Crown Court heard the grim details of how the victim was subjected to “frenzied” stabbing during the attack, while Ratcliffe sat in the dock doing puzzles in a Sudoku magazine on his knee.
Ratcliffe was said to have not shown any emotion as a 999 call by a shocked dog walker, who first came across Brianna’s body, deemed too graphic to be made public, was played to the court.
The judge, lawyers and court decided to handle Ratcliffe, 15, carefully as he had been diagnosed with autism, selective mutism and a high level of social anxiety.
Following his arrest, he is said to have become more mute being incapable of speech, except with his mother.
During the trial, he was allowed to give evidence by typing his answers onto a computer, his words displayed on a screen for the jury and read out by an intermediary.
At every court appearance, he wore a shirt and tie and carried puzzle magazines while being accompanied by an appropriate adult and two social workers. He was also given tangle or fidget toys, a therapeutic device to aid calmness.
As proceedings continued, he was provided with an arrow pointer and printed card with numbered options ranging from one – ‘I’m feeling fine’ to five – ‘I’m feeling poorly’.
Some were not convinced Ratcliffe’s mutism is entirely involuntary and suspect it may be a tactic to elicit sympathy and avoid responsibility, although others concede it may be the genuine result of the trauma of his involvement in the murder.
Ratcliffe grew up the middle child of three, with an older brother and younger sister, in Leigh, Greater Manchester and his family lived normal lives, with his mother working as an online fitness, a wellbeing coach and latterly a ski instructor.
Sources have told the PA news agency that she has recently been asked to leave her job as a ski instructor because of the publicity around the case.
Ratcliffe took part in a kickboxing competition in Jamaica in 2018, aged 11, and the family enjoyed skiing holidays and weekends boating in the Lake District. He had no previous run-ins with police and was said to be conscientious in his studies.
He knew Scarlett Jenkinson, Brianna’s other killer, from the age of 11 from their school, Culcheth High, where they both attended until she was asked to leave. Sources said this was over pupils being given cannabis-laced gummy sweets.
Jenkinson tried to persuade him to kill Brianna a week before the murder. Ratcliffe agreed to the murder but baulked at the timing. He was unwilling to help on a school night as he had to revise.
In a notebook found in Jenkinson’s bedroom by police she had written a page describing Ratcliffe as “trustworthy” and a “sociopath”.
She said he was someone who is “someone that doesn’t have many, or no emotions”. He had only three followers on Instagram and though he liked one girl in particular, felt himself “socially inept” so leant on Jenkinson to help him find the words to speak to her.
Hours after Brianna’s murder he returned to the subject, asking Jenkinson about sending a message to the girl he liked as Valentine’s Day was approaching.
Ratcliffe was portrayed by his lawyers as being manipulated by his friend and co-defendant. But while Jenkinson was the driving force behind the murder plans, he was a willing participant.
The court heard how the pair had lived in a “cocooned” world of dark fantasies, with Ratcliffe indulging Jenkinson’s blood lust and fascination for torture and death. And it was Ratcliffe who brought the hunting knife used to kill.
The day of the murder was the first time he had met Brianna and he claimed he was “admiring trees” and relieving himself in the woods when Jenkinson began stabbing Brianna, claiming he played no part in the attack.
He also claimed the blood on his hands, shoes and coat was the result of him checking on the victim. But evidence suggested it was Ratcliffe who wielded the knife, stabbing Brianna in a frenzy, front and back, head and neck, 28 times, as she tried in vain to fend off the blows.
Ratcliffe’s father attended his trial sporadically, his mother every day, often making notes, while their son made no eye contact with either of them throughout.
After the guilty verdict, his mother was inconsolable, sobbing with her head in her hands, as her son was taken down to the cells.
Ratcliffe is now being held at Barton Moss, a secure youth accommodation unit in Salford, where it has been said his apparent “arrogance” has not endeared him to everyone. He is said to have complained about the food, moaning about fruit not being fresh enough for him.
And after one day’s harrowing evidence in court during the trial last December he returned to his accommodation, breezed into his bedroom and quickly changed into his ‘Christmas jumper’, eager to participate in that night’s festive activities planned for the boys on the unit, sources said.
