The Southport Death may want to hurt the community, said Brother

The brother of the Southport killer has told a public inquiry into the dance class attacks that he believes his brother could have been “socially ill at worst”.

Axel Rudakapan, then 17, killed three children in a Taylor Swift-testove-testo incident in the city of Merseyside on 29 July 2024.

Dion Rudakubana, 21, gave evidence from a secure location via Fineolink for a second day of inquiry, sitting at Liverpool Town Hall.

Asked about his brother’s motivation for the attack, he said: “Children are very valuable to society in the future of society.”

He told the question that he was upstairs on the morning of the attack when he saw his brother leaving the house wearing a face mask.

Dion said she did not believe her brother had left home since March 2022, when he was arrested on a bus with a knife.

He told the question that he “got a little nervous”.

Richard Boyle, counsel for the inquiry, asked: “Your concern is that he did not walk, but went out to carry out the attack?”

Dion replied: “Initially, maybe, yes.”

He said he wasn’t too worried as his parents appeared to believe his brother was just missing.

He said that shortly after his mother showed him the packaging from a knife, said to have been found in the washing machine.

In a statement, Dion said there were no discussions about contacting the police at that point.

“I don’t believe he intended to harm anyone and wondered if he was carrying a knife to protect himself, not to harm others,” he said.

Asked if he should have contacted the police over his fear, he said: “It’s not enough for me.”

Dion told the question that he came home from university on 26 July last year and his father told him that his brother had done “bad”.

He said he did not remember his father explaining that he had stopped his brother while he was trying to get a taxi to his former school, the High School, on 22 July.

He said: “The reason why he gave any information about it is because he told me to be careful around him.”

The inquiry heard a message from a friend on 27 July, Dion explained what his father said, writing: “You can kill him.”

He said: “I don’t think he directly said ‘he can kill you’ but implied there was a threat to life and I felt that.”

In a statement given to the question, Dion also said that he was and continues to be “devastated and saddened by the great pain, grief inflicted on my brother”.

The inquiry later heard from Killer Alphonse Rudakapan’s father, who was asked what information he had shared with various agencies about his son’s “harmful” behavior.

On several occasions Rudakubaca made outbursts in which he threatened to kill his father, the questioner heard.

Nicholas Moss KC, Counsel to the Inquiry Read from a statement given at the inquiry by Mr Rudakapan, who spoke of how his son was very frightened”.

During this time, his father remembered how his Son “poured a significant amount of oil” on his head and threatened to kill him “in human terms”.

Mr. Moss asked what he meant by menacing.

Mr. Rudakubaa said his son appeared to have some kind of “mental illness” before.

He said: “He was in front of me, he clapped me on my chest, saying if you let me out of here, in this house, you will be a month, but trust me.

He said that the reference to leaving the house came from a comment about a week earlier when he suggested that in the future the son should live in a different house.

Mr. Moss read from Mr. Rudakabana’s statement, which said he and his wife were “very scared” for his son.

Mr Rudukabana also said the family “felt isolated” after settling in the UK following the Rwandan Genocide in the 1990s.

He said: “We made a decision to wait until they grow up and understand and are less affected. I was shocked – they arrived home in Rwanda both of them, they were surprised at school.

“We tell them some things we think they can handle.”

He said he did not believe this discussion affected his family in the UK.

“I think what affected them was that we were a small family with two friends from Rwanda [in the UK]” he said.

“They see that we are kind of lonely compared to their peers, their friends from school. So they see that we are in a foreign land that they think they were born here.”