Lucy Powell, who is Labour & Co-op MP for Manchester Central, asked if the defendants in Yousef Makki’s murder trial would have been acquitted if they had ‘been black’
An MP has been praised for speaking out about the murder trial of 17-year-old Yousef Makki after she asked if the defendants would have been acquitted if they ‘were black.’
Lucy Powell, who is Labour & Co-op MP for Manchester Central, tweeted about Yousef’s case on Saturday shortly after the court case ended.
She said: ‘You do have to ask if these defendants were black, at state school and from, say, Moss Side whether they would have been acquitted.’
Several people responded to the tweet saying ‘my thoughts exactly’ and that they had asked ‘the same question’ after hearing the teenagers wouldn’t be jailed.
Yousef Makki was stabbed to death in Hale Barns, an upmarket village in Cheshire, in March.
The teenager, who was from an Anglo-Lebanese family from Burnage, south Manchester, had won a scholarship to the prestigious £12,000-a-year Manchester Grammar School.
The defendant, boy A, and another boy, 17, boy B, both from wealthy Cheshire families, were cleared of all charges following a four-week trial at Manchester Crown Court.
Neither of the defendants can be named because they are aged under 18.
Ms Powell responded to a tweet about the case said: ‘You do have to ask if these defendants were black, at state school and from, say, Moss Side whether they would have been acquitted’
Yousef Makki, 17, pictured, was stabbed to death in Hale Barns in March. On Friday two teenage defendants, boy A and boy B, both from wealthy Cheshire families, were cleared of all charges
In the responses to Ms Powell’s tweet several people said they agreed with her in questioning the outcome of the case.
One person said: ‘Nope if they were black they would of been named in media given long long sentences and black on black crime would if been brought up.
‘As it stand lesson to be learnt from this is class and poverty affect your sentence.’
While another said ‘exactly what I thought Lucy. My thoughts exactly’ and someone else agreed adding ‘my thoughts exactly. They would be going down.’
Another person also added: ‘Asked exactly the same question tonight over dinner They were both carrying knives FFS.’
And someone else replied to the tweet praising the MP for mentioning the case on her Twitter account by writing: ‘Well done on speaking out Lucy.’
Several people responded and agreed that the outcome could have been different if the two defendants had been black
However some said her opinion might be different if she had sat through the court case and said the MP shouldn’t use the case to make a point about race.
They said: ‘It’s really unwise to use this case as some sort of example of very real issues to do with race and criminal justice when you didn’t actually hear any of the evidence at all. If you had sat through the trial of course it’d be different.’
During the four-week trial the court heard how Boy B had bought the knives online using a false name and had them posted from China to a friend’s address.
Officers later found a dark coloured ‘flick knife’ behind a low boundary wall near the scene of the killing plus a silver coloured lock knife in some bushes and recovered a flick knife from down a grid.
Others said they agreed with the ‘state school aspect’ of Ms Powell’s tweet on Saturday
However others said the MP might have a different opinion if she had sat through the trial
The stabbing was an ‘accident waiting to happen’ as all three indulged in ‘idiotic fantasies’ playing middle class gangsters, the jury heard.
Despite the privileged backgrounds of both defendants, they led ‘double lives’.
Calling each other ‘Bro’ and ‘Fam’ and the police ‘Feds’, the defendants and Yousef smoked cannabis, road around on bikes, ‘chilling’ and listened to rap or drill music.
They would post videos on social media, making threats and posing with ‘shanks’ or knives.
Yousef’s grieving father Ghaleb Makki shouted: ‘F*** you! Where’s the justice for my son! Where’s the justice?’ as the jury delivered the verdict on Friday.
The court heard how hours before the stabbing, Boy B arranged a £45 cannabis deal and the teenagers planned to rob the drug dealer, a ‘soft target’.
During the trial the court heard how hours before the stabbing, Boy B arranged a £45 cannabis deal and the teenagers planned to rob the drug dealer, a ‘soft target’. Pictured is Yousef Makki
Yousef’s mother Deborah Makki, a psychiatric nurse, planted a tree in his memory on the grounds of his school in Manchester earlier this year
But the robbery went wrong and Yousef and Boy B fled, leaving Boy A to take a beating.
Boy A then later pushed Yousef who called him a ‘p****’ and punched him in the face.
He told the jury Yousef pulled out a knife and he responded by also taking out a knife and his victim was accidentally stabbed.
Boy A broke down in tears telling the jury: ‘I got more annoyed. I [took] it out straight away, I don’t really know what I did, kind of lifted my arm up. I didn’t realise anything had happened at first.’
As the victim lay dying, the panicking defendants hid the knives in bushes and down a drain, dialled 999 and tried to staunch the blood pouring out of Yousef’s chest wound.
A passing heart surgeon performed emergency surgery in the back of an ambulance but Yousef suffered catastrophic blood loss.
They told police scrambled to the scene they had found Yousef stabbed and suggested others were responsible.