Two children killed and eleven people injured in stabbing at dance class in England, police say

LONDON (AP) — Bleeding children ran screaming from a dance and yoga class “like a scene from a horror movie” to escape a teenager’s brutal knife attack that killed two children and injured 11 other people in northwest England on Monday, police and witnesses said.

A 17-year-old boy has been arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder in connection with the stabbing in Southport, a seaside town near Liverpool, Merseyside Police said. The motive was unclear, but police said investigators were not treating the attack as terrorist-related.

Nine children were injured – six of them in a critical condition – in the latest headline-grabbing attack amid a recent rise in knife crime that has stoked fears and led to calls for the Government to do more against bladed weapons.

Two injured adults who tried to protect the students are in critical condition, police said.

“We believe the injured adults were bravely trying to protect the children who were attacked,” said Merseyside Police Commissioner Serena Kennedy.

The Taylor Swift-themed workshop took place during the first week of school holidays for children aged 6 to 11. According to an online listing, the two-hour session was led by two women – a yoga teacher and a dance teacher.

Witnesses reported hearing bloodcurdling screams and seeing blood-soaked children coming out of the store, which hosts everything from pregnancy workshops and meditation sessions to boot camps for women.

“They were on the street, running out of the nursery,” said Bare Varathan, who owns a shop nearby. “They were covered in stab wounds, here, here, here, everywhere,” pointing to the neck, back and chest.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer described the attack as “appalling and deeply shocking.” King Charles III expressed his “condolences, prayers and deepest sympathy” to those affected by the “absolutely horrific incident.”

Shortly before noon, the police were called to a street in the city of 100,000 inhabitants, where several small shops are located behind rows of brick houses.

The first officers to arrive were shocked to find so many victims of the “brutal attack,” most of them children with serious injuries, Kennedy said.

Colin Parry, owner of a car repair shop, said most of the victims of the stabbing appeared to be young girls.

“The mothers come here now and scream,” said Parry. “It’s like a scene from a horror movie. … It’s like something from America, not like sunny Southport.”

The suspect, whose identity has not yet been established, lived in a village about 8 kilometers from the crime scene, police said. He was originally from Cardiff in Wales.

Ryan Carney, who lives with his mother on the street, said his mother saw emergency workers carrying children “who were red and covered in blood. She said she could see the stab wounds on the children’s backs.”

“None of these things ever happen here,” he said. “You hear about them, stabbings and things like that in big cities, in Manchester, in London. This is sunny Southport. That’s what people call it. The sun is shining. It’s a beautiful place.”

The worst attack on children in Britain occurred in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot dead 16 kindergarten children and their teacher in a school gym in Dunblane, Scotland. In the following years, the private ownership of almost all handguns was banned in Britain.

Mass shootings and killings with firearms are rare in the UK; in the year to March 2023, knives were used in around 40% of homicides.