A fifteen-year-old school girl was stabbed to death on a bus in Croydon on her way to school on Wednesday, 27 September. Elianne Andham boarded the bus to school, as she did every morning, and got off at Wellesley Road, Croydon, South London, for school around 8:30 am, but was killed just after, much to the horror of surrounding school pupils (The Independent, September 2023). She later died from a severe neck injury at 9:20 am (The Guardian, September 2023).
The culprit was a seventeen-year-old boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, who appeared at a youth court hearing this morning and will be brought to court at The Old Bailey on the 3rd of October.
It is believed that the stabbing occurred after an argument broke out between the culprit and the victim when he tried to give her flowers (BBC News, September 2023). Many have taken to social media to give support and condolences to the family and loved ones of the young Elianne Andham, whose family described her as “the light of our lives”, in a statement given to the Metropolitan police:
“Our hearts are broken by the senseless death of our daughter. [...] Elianne was the light of our lives. She was bright and funny, with many friends who all adored her. She was only 15, and had her whole life ahead of her, with hopes and dreams for the future.”
(The Telegraph, September 2023).
Many have also pointed out that the crime must have been premeditated, for the boy to have brought the knife with him in case the young girl rejected his advances (BBC News, September 2023).
Laura Bates, a feminist activist and writer, who has released books, such as Everyday Sexism and Why Men Hate Women (which looks into the modern-day indoctrination of young boys and violent misogyny), commented in an Instagram post on the matter:
“One woman is murdered by a man in the UK every 3 days. A man accused of rape and abuse by multiple women can whip up support from millions of online fans by spreading conspiracy theories about false allegations. Male journalists can joke on air about how (un)shaggable their female peers are. Thousands of police officers stand accused of sexual misconduct and domestic abuse but even when one deceives a woman into a decades long relationship that results in a child using a false identity the CPS declines to prosecute. Teenage girls learn that the risk of rejecting a boy could be a death sentence. But the ones who dare to talk about sexism are branded man hating feminazis in the classroom. Just 1.4% of rapes reported to the police result in a charge or summons. Videos from men who preach grabbing women by the throat and banging out a machete are pumped out by algorithm until they’ve been viewed 11.6 billion times online, more than the number of people on the planet. Teenage boys attack girls with real life weapons. Mainstream newspapers publish fantasies about parading women naked down the street and pelting them with excrement and smearing female politics with accusations of opening their legs in parliament to distract the prime minister. 79% of young people see sexually violent online porn before the age of 18. Research finds 97% of women in the UK have been sexually harassed. A quarter will experience domestic abuse (1.6 million each year). Half a million are sexually assaulted and 85,000 raped each year. But men who kill their wives are eulogised in headlines as tragic and misunderstood. Now tell me this isn’t a public health crisis. This is a form of extremism nobody is talking about. When boys are groomed and radicalised into extremist hate online but we don’t describe it as terrorism. The impact on women’s lives is devastating but we can’t see it as a national emergency because we accept it as normal. We have to join the dots. We have to start talking about this and take action before more women and girls pay for our inaction with their lives.”
(Laura Bates, Instagram, September 2023).
The suspect will be in court on October 4.
Edited by: Anwen Venn
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