Brianna Ghey inquest: ‘No reason to suspect’ teenager’s friendship with her murderer was ‘anything but genuine’, coroner rules

There was “no reason to suspect” Brianna Ghey’s friendship with one of her murderers was “anything but genuine”, a coroner has ruled.

Brianna, 16, was stabbed 28 times in the head, neck, chest and back with a hunting knife after being lured to Linear Park in Warrington on 11 February last year.

Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe, both aged 15 at the time of the murder, were jailed for life and ordered to serve 22 years and 20 years respectively in February.

Brianna had been a pupil at Birchwood High School, Warrington, where she was befriended by Jenkinson who had transferred from Culcheth High School, where Ratcliffe was a pupil, after she “spiked” a younger pupil with cannabis-laced sweets.

Within weeks of her “managed transfer” from Culcheth, Jenkinson became obsessed by Brianna and began plotting her murder with Ratcliffe.

The three-day inquest at Cheshire Coroner’s Court examined safeguarding for all three teenagers and how Brianna was brought into contact with Jenkinson.

Concluding the hearings into the murder, Jacqueline Devonish, senior coroner for Cheshire, said the teenager was unlawfully killed and their schools or local authority could not have foreseen her murder.

Ms Devonish said today: “There was no reason for anyone to suspect the friendship [between Brianna and Jenkinson] was anything other than genuine.

“I found Birchwood High School offered Brianna a high standard of support within a caring environment.”

Ms Devonish said there were no visible signs that Brianna was at risk from Jenkinson.

She added: “She had been planning Brianna’s murder since late 2022. Eddie Ratcliffe was the only person who knew, other than Scarlett Jenkinson.

“I found that the schools could not have reasonably foreseen that Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe would have plotted and murdered Brianna.

“It could not have, on the evidence available at the time, reasonably have been foreseen that Scarlett Jenkinson was mentally unstable so that she would kill.”

Both Brianna and Jenkinson had a history of self-harm and personal issues affecting their schooling.

Jenkinson had also assaulted another pupil and turned up for class drunk and smelling of cannabis.

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From age 14, she had enjoyed watching videos of real killing and torture on the dark web, fantasised about murder and developed an interest in serial killers, her murder trial heard.

But the “dark fantasies” she shared with Ratcliffe were not known to either school or any other adults, their trial heard.

At Ratcliffe and Jenkinson’s sentencing, the judge told the pair: “Both of you played a full part in killing Brianna and both intended she should die.”

Mrs Justice Yip also said she had taken into account the “sadistic motive [of Jenkinson] and transphobic hostility [of Ratcliffe]”.

On the opening day of the inquest on Wednesday, two statements from Ratcliffe’s mother Alice Hemmings were read out where she described her son as a “good child with good morals and a loving and caring family behind him”.

Ms Hemmings also said: “Eddie clearly knows right and wrong, good and bad, and isn’t a risk taker.”

Brianna was described as an anxious and vulnerable teenager, with her mother Esther Ghey believing this was partly because she spent a lot of time on her phone.

She was also diagnosed with autism and ADHD and was transitioning gender.

Ms Ghey said her daughter had become “immersed in darkness”, falling behind in schoolwork and spending a lot of time online, garnering thousands of followers on TikTok and YouTube by posting video content.

She added that her daughter’s online world was “very toxic” and she was deemed to be at risk of sexual exploitation.

Before her murder, concerns had been raised about her interactions online but she had refused to let her mother have access to her phone and her school could not take the device off her either, the hearing was told.

Ms Ghey is now campaigning to raise awareness of the dangers of social media to children and for greater parental controls to be put in place.