Merseyside Police said it is investigating a number of “positive lines of enquiry” as the manhunt continues for the killer of nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel.
On Thursday, Detective Chief Superintendent Mark Kameen gave a direct message to the gunman: “We will not rest until we find you, and we will find you.”
“Poor Olivia was murdered brutally in her own home,” Mr Kameen told reporters, while confirming the gunman was still on the run.
He said his previous appeal for the man to surrender himself to police had failed.
Police praised the “phenomenal support” from local communities.
“I am incredibly grateful for shear levels of engagement we have received so far,” Mr Kameen said. “This level of working together simply must continue.”
The name of the suspected assassin is already reported to have been given to detectives following Monday night’s shootings which claimed Olivia’s life and injured her mother, Cheryl, after a man burst into their home to try to escape a gunman.
The man, who was shot in the torso and legs, has since been named as convicted criminal Joseph Nee, 35. He was on Wednesday arrested by police while in hospital being treated for his injuries and told that he will be returned to prison for breaching the terms of a licence issued on his release from a jail term imposed for previous offending.
Police said he would also be questioned about the murder as part of their inquiry to try to track down the man who shot him, Olivia and her mother, as well as those responsible for supplying the weapon and ordering the apparent hit on Nee, who police have emphasised had no connection to the little girl or her family. One newspaper today reported that he was refusing to talk, while another highlighted a post on the Facebook page of one of his family members containing a picture of a gun with the caption: “Snitches get stitches.”
Ian Byrne, the Labour MP for Liverpool West Derby, said he was confident that enough people would come forward and that the killer would be tracked down. “There’s information coming in all the time. It’s really heartening to hear and see,” he told the BBC.
“We’ve got community centres...where information is getting put through... so there are lots of avenues where people can give the information required to make sure the investigation is successful and we take these horrendous people off our streets who have done such a heinous crime.”
He said that although there was “fear of retribution” the horror of Olivia’s killing “has really reached out and touched people”.
As police try to track down the killer one possibility is that he was being sheltered by criminal associates in the area. Another is that he might have tried to flee to another part of the country or abroad.
Meanwhile, details of Nee’s criminal history emerged. He was jailed for 45 months in 2018 after he and two other men led police on a high-speed chase. He admitted two counts of burglary, two of theft of a motor vehicle, dangerous driving, driving without insurance and driving while disqualified. He had previously been jailed in November 2009 at Liverpool crown court for six-and-a-half years for being a “lower level player” in a multi-million-pound drugs importation ring.
Olivia’s death was one of three fatal shootings in the area in a week and came 15 years after 11-year-old Rhys Jones was shot dead on his way home from football training in Croxteth, Liverpool. Officers from Merseyside Police carried out a series of raids targeting gun crime in the city yesterday as tributes continued to pour in for the schoolgirl.
Detective Chief Superintendent Mark Kameen told the BBC: “We are receiving CCTV, we are receiving names, we are receiving information. People are telling us where they were and what areas they were in, which is absolutely fantastic.”
Olivia was at home with two older siblings when her mother opened the door after hearing gunshots outside. Ms Korbel, 46, was shot in the wrist as she tried to close the door on the gunman while Olivia stood behind her. The family last night released three pictures of the junior school pupil.
