Teen stabs father-of-two more than 100 times with samurai sword, raps about 'laughing' during murder in song
One of the teens who was sentenced to life in prison after killing a father-of-two by stabbing him with a samurai sword over 100 times bragged about laughing as he carried out the brutal murder in a disturbing rap song, it has been revealed. Kiyran Earnshaw, 18, and Luke Gaukroger, 16, were sentenced at the Leeds Crown Court this past week to minimum terms of 22 years and 16 years, eight months respectively in the killing of 53-year-old Robert Wilson, according to the Daily Mail.
The teens had been confronted by Wilson, as well as his colleagues Paul Thewliss and John Badejo, after they were caught loitering outside the Thornton and Ross pharmaceutical plant in Huddersfield, West Yorks, this past January.
After initially claiming they were just looking for their phones, Earnshaw reached into his jogging bottoms and pulled out a blue, 20-inch samurai sword that he used to stab Wilson repeatedly. The entire incident was recorded on the victim's phone as he called a security firm for help.
As Earnshaw continued beating and stabbing Wilson, Gaukroger reportedly asked to join the assault by shouting, "Pass me the shank! Pass me the shank!" The teen, then 15, proceeded to continue the attack, briefly stopping to catch his breath and to steal Wilson's coat.
"Earnshaw and Gaukroger together holding the sword and crouching to the upper body then seem to make a concerted effort to saw the head from the shoulders," Peter Makepeace QC, prosecuting, told the court. "Both then jointly stab the upper body using their combined force."
When police reached the scene, they reportedly saw one of the teens "using the sword in sawing motion to the neck area of the deceased as if trying to detach the head from the body."
The court heard that, before the attack, the teens were seen taking tablets "washed down with vodka and other alcohol." Makepeace said Earnshaw had been slurring his speech after his apprehension and told officers he had taken cocaine and the Xanax -- tests on drugs he had in his possession determined it was Flualprazolam, an artificial substance similar to Xanax which produces drowsiness, confusion, and disinhibition.
At the hearing, both defendants admitted murdering Wilson and causing Badejo grievous bodily harm with intent. Handing out their life sentences, Mr. Justice Lavender read Gaukroger's lyrics from a rap song he had written about wanting to lie in court about feeling remorse for the attack and said he should expect no leniency.
In one of the lines to the rap, which he titled 'No Remorse,' the 16-year-old wrote is "I was still stabbing up the guy's chest, laughing cause his my knife works best," while in another, he bragged about the victim struggling for his last breath. Lavender told Gaukroger he "reveled" in his crime, adding, "You congratulated yourself on what you call your knife work."
Paul Greaney QC, defending, claimed his client's "dreadful" lyrics "may appear to glorify murder" but that he had expressed remorse to a probation officer and in a letter to his instructing solicitors. He said the rap was just a way of "working through his immature feelings."