An anti-knife crime campaigner who visited the Sheffield school where a teenager was fatally stabbed has said he hopes “no warnings were missed”.
Harvey Willgoose, a 15-year-old pupil, was stabbed to death at All Saints Catholic High School in Sheffield on Monday.
Anthony Olaseinde, founder and chief executive of Always An Alternative, a charity supporting young people and raising awareness about knife crime, gang culture and anti-social behaviour, said he held a small seven-week knife crime awareness programme at the school in 2022.
“I just hope there were no warnings beforehand that were missed,” the 37-year-old told the PA news agency.
“If it was going to happen, then there’s nothing you can do – you can’t prepare yourself for a random attack.
“But if there were signs that this was going to happen, and this has happened as a result, then it’s not looking very good on the school.”
Mr Olaseinde offered the anti-knife programme to several schools across Sheffield and he said All Saints Catholic High School were keen to be involved and put forward a small group of pupils to take part.
“There was five or six students that got involved in one of our knife crime awareness projects where they were given the opportunity to create a short movie,” he said.
“They learned how to act, they learnt how to do dialogs, script, record, edit, absolutely everything to do with it and they created a short film or a short movie to spread awareness of knife crime.
“(The message was) you don’t have to be in a gang or you don’t have to be a young black male… this can affect anybody.”
The group of half a dozen students teamed up with pupils from two other Sheffield schools to create a short film entitled Why Me? to raise awareness about how people from all walks of life can be impacted by knife crime.
Police officers outside All Saints Catholic High School (Richard McCarthy/PA)
Mr Olaseinde said from his experience he did not believe All Saints Catholic High School had an issue with knife crime, but two other schools taking part had students at high risk of using knives.
He said Monday’s fatal stabbing was “absolutely terrifying”.
“A young boy has died and someone’s locked up for it, so two lives have felt the direct impact – family and friends will also feel the impact,” he said.
“It was in a school, on school grounds, in school time – (it’s) absolutely terrifying.”
Mr Olaseinde believes knife crime in the UK has become “normal” and is “embedded” in society, and has called for more regular talks raising awareness about knife crime in schools.
“I think, now, knife crime has become normal and it’s embedded,” he said.
“If you caught this issue a lot earlier, then I think occasional talks where people go in and do a talk on knife crime would have happened.
“But it’s a lot more normal – you’re going to have to need a lot more intense and longer programmes to start reducing it.”
Floral tributes left outside All Saints Catholic High School, on Granville Road in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, after a 15-year-old boy died following a stabbing incident at the school (Richard McCarthy/PA)
His charity aims to change the mindsets of young people who are at high risk of carrying weapons to make positive life choices.
“When I was going around and doing talks with different young people, with different communities, with different professionals, I soon found that the issue wasn’t actually the knife,” he explained.
“The knife could be a tool or it could be a weapon, but that’s up to the person that’s holding it.
“Therefore, it allowed us to start drilling down on the mindset of these people that are at high risk of carrying weapons.
“I’d just like the young people to ask themselves before they’re in that positioning of picking up a knife: is it worth it?”
South Yorkshire Police said a 15-year-old boy who was arrested on suspicion of murder remains in custody.