Teenage killers Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe who murdered Brianna Ghey handed life sentences

Two teenagers who killed schoolgirl Brianna Ghey have been handed life sentences for her murder.

On Friday, the pair were pictured and named for the first time as 16-year-old’s Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe.

The killers, both 15 at the time, had been found guilty of the “disturbing” plan to murder Brianna, 16, in a “frenzied and ferocious” knife attack.

Anxious and vulnerable, unsuspecting transgender schoolgirl Brianna was stabbed with a hunting knife 28 times in her head, neck, chest and back after being lured to Linear Park, Culcheth, a village near Warrington, Cheshire, on the afternoon of February 11 last year.

On Friday, the pair were sentenced at Manchester Crown Court by Mrs Justice Yip.

Scarlett Jenkinson was ordered to serve a minimum of 22 years in prison and Eddie Ratcliffe 20 years before being eligible for parole.

Ahead of sentencing, Brianna’s father Peter Spooner said being the father of a transgender child had been “a difficult thing to deal with” but he had been “proud to gain another beautiful daughter”.

He told the court: “We were forming a new relationship and these two murderers have stolen that from us both.

“I hate how Brianna’s life has been brutally taken away from her and she has been deprived of the life she wanted to live. She never had the chance to sit her exams or go on to further education.

“Now my world has been torn apart, justice may have been done with the guilty verdicts, but no amount of time spent in prison will be enough for these monsters.

“I cannot call them children as that makes them sound naive or vulnerable which they are not, they are pure evil, Brianna was the vulnerable one.”

Deanna Heer KC, prosecuting, said Brianna’s mother Esther Ghey had planned to read a statement to the court but she would be reading it on her behalf.

She added: “Esther, I think it’s fair to say, can’t bring herself to do it.”

In the statement, Ms Ghey said the “hardest thing” to come to terms with was finding out that one of those charged with Brianna’s murder was someone she believed to be her daughter’s friend.

She said she had been “pleased” when Brianna sent a text message on February 11 to say she was going to meet a friend.

She said: “I thought that she would have a wonderful time, hanging around with her friend and getting some fresh air. When all that time she was being lured to her death.

“All I can think about is that she would have been scared and I wasn’t there for her. She needed me to protect her, Brianna wasn’t a fighter and she must have been so terrified.”

Brianna Ghey, Cheshire Constabulary Cheshire Constabulary

Jenkinson, Brianna’s school friend and the daughter of teachers, was identified only as girl X during their trial last December at Manchester Crown Court.

Ratcliffe, from Leigh, whose mother is a skiing instructor and father runs his own businesses, had been identified only as boy Y.

Each had denied murder and blamed the other for the killing, described as “horrific” by detectives.

Media were banned from naming them during the four-week trial because of their ages.

After they were found guilty of murder by the jury, trial judge Mrs Justice Yip ruled the press could name the two at their sentencing hearing on Friday following an appeal on behalf of the media.