Holly Newton murder: Teenager who killed 15-year-old ex-girlfriend in knife attack jailed for life

The teenager who stabbed 15-year-old Holly Newton to death in Northumberland has been jailed for life, with a minimum term of 17 years.

Logan MacPhail, 17, followed ex-girlfriend Holly through Hexham town centre in January last year, before attacking her – inflicting 36 injuries in just over a minute.

A 16-year-old boy who was with Holly at the time and tried to help her was also stabbed, leaving him with injuries to his shoulder, arm, and thigh which needed surgery.

MacPhail was found guilty of murder and wounding with intent in August. He initially couldn’t be identified, but earlier this month a judge changed that decision because he turns 18 on 9 December.

Prosecutors had previously told jurors that MacPhail was “jealous” Holly was with a new boy. The trial previously heard Holly had also told a friend that he was “basically stalking her”.

Sentencing the teenager on Friday at Newcastle Crown Court, Mr Justice Hilliard said: “You made a conscious decision to stab a 15-year-old girl to death with a knife that you were carrying unlawfully in a public place having followed her secretly around town for an hour, all because your relationship with her had ended.

“What happened in this case should not happen to any child or any parent.

“All those years ahead for a 15-year-old girl that she and they [her family] will never see.”

After following Holly and the boy she was with for 45 minutes, MacPhail, who was 16 at the time, waited at a bus stop and asked to speak to Holly after she came out of a pizza shop.

He then lured her down an alleyway and attacked her.

MacPhail inflicted 36 knife wounds, including five “defensive” injuries in the early evening attack.

Holly was taken to Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary but couldn’t be saved.

The killer – who has autism and low IQ – denied murder but admitted manslaughter, saying he couldn’t remember stabbing Holly or her friend and had planned to harm himself.

‘She would have helped anyone’

Speaking to media before the sentencing, Holly’s mother and stepdad Micala and Lee Trussler described the schoolgirl as someone who “really, really cared about other people”.

“[She] would have helped anyone,” Mrs Trussler said, adding: “I never, ever had one complaint in the community or at school. She was just always really, really nice and polite.”

They said Holly’s death has had a “huge impact” on their family, especially her younger siblings.

“It’s not normal life. It’s a different life. You’ve got the life before Holly died and the life after Holly died. It’s never normal,” Holly’s mother said.

“But it’s more about getting into a routine, especially for the other children. I have to just get on with things for them.”

She said MacPhail was “obsessed” with her daughter, but neither she nor her husband realised just how much “until his behaviour changed”.

“He definitely felt that if he couldn’t have her [Holly], then nobody could. He said that to her at one point, she told me he did… what we didn’t know is that he meant it,” Mrs Trussler said.

Mr Trussler added that after he heard MacPhail had been found guilty of murder, it was “like a massive weight had been lifted” off his shoulders.

“That night was probably the first decent night’s sleep I had got since the 27 January,” he said.

Mrs Trussler added: “Obviously, we wanted a guilty verdict. But regardless, it doesn’t bring Holly back.”

Detective Sergeant Darren Davies, from the major investigation team at Northumbria Police said Holly “didn’t appreciate the nature of what was happening with MacPhail”.

He added: “From someone who’s got a child of a similar age, it is shocking to know what’s going on and especially for it to be in a relationship situation. [It is] shocking for everyone involved, even for police.”

Lynsey Colling, deputy chief crown prosecutor from Crown Prosecution Service North East added: “It was a very important case to prosecute because we wanted to ensure that justice was achieved.”