A would-be Southport copycat killer who wanted to attack a dance school and an Oasis reunion concert has been locked up for 14 months.
McKenzie Morgan, 18, from Cwmbran in South Wales, told friends of plans to target the concert in Cardiff on July 4, and had a note targeting the dance club near his home, the Old Bailey heard.
Axel Rudakubana, 18, was jailed for minimum of 52 years last January for murdering three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in the Merseyside town in July 2024, when he was aged 17.
Morgan, who was also aged 17 at the time of the offences, had pleaded guilty to possessing a document useful for terrorism.
On Friday, Judge Sarah Whitehouse KC sentenced him at the Old Bailey to 14 months in youth detention.
She imposed a criminal behaviour order to supervise him upon his release from youth detention and a further year on licence.
In a televised sentencing, the judge told Morgan: “You are a danger to yourself because you self-harm and have thoughts of suicide.
“You are also at high risk of harm from others because you have autism and are vulnerable to being bullied or being groomed and radicalised.
“There is no clear evidence from any of the reports or other material that you have any specific political, religious or racial ideology. That leads me to conclude that you have no terrorist connection or motivation.
“Your motivation appears to have been to emulate the extreme level of violence used by Axel Rudakubana in the Southport attack.”
Prosecutor Corinne Bramwell had told the court how Morgan had praised the Southport attacker in Snapchat messages between last April 7 and June 2.
He shared images of Rudakubana, saying that he wanted to engage in a similar terrorist-style attack and was trying to make the deadly poison ricin, the court was told.
One of the people on Snapchat reported Morgan to police and he was also referred to children’s mental health services due to concerns from his mother.
Morgan told a psychiatric nurse on June 2 that he wanted to hurt others, and he planned to commit a Rudakubana-style terrorist attack, Ms Bramwell said.
He said that he had been researching bombs and poison and how to stab and kill people, having enjoyed watching terrorist attacks.
The nurse disclosed the conversation to police and recommended an autism assessment.
Later the same day, police arrested Morgan at his home in Cwmbran, South Wales.
Officers seized his electronic devices and mobile phones, on which the terrorist manual was found.
Further examination revealed that last April, Morgan had sent a message asking “how to burn people’s faces”.
He had stated: “In my head I now have the motivation to go ahead with some sort of attack.”
He also sent a picture of a 15cm kitchen knife advertised on Amazon to another Snapchat user with the question: “Would this work?”
Ms Bramwell said records showed he had gone on to attempt to buy the knife.
Last April 26, he searched online for two local playgrounds and a youth dance academy.
Two days later, he created a note on his mobile telephone on “places to attack” which included a screenshot of the dance academy identified on a map.
On Snapchat messaging, he revealed a further plan to bomb the July 4 Oasis concert at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff and that he had tried to make ricin
In May, he made screenshots of news articles about police investigating an alleged attack on a prison officer by the Southport killer.
On the day of his arrest, Morgan researched knives and searched for the school where he had attended until June 2024.
He told police that he had been unhappy and been bullied at school, the court was told.
Mitigating, Michael Stradling said: “I asked him what he wants to say and what I would described as a true heartfelt manner he said that he wanted you to know that he is very sorry.”
Morgan could not be identified previously during the trial because of his age, but the restriction was lifted on his 18th birthday.
Speaking after the case, Detective Superintendent Andrew Williams, of Counter Terrorism Policing Wales, said: “Mr Morgan was not born bad.
“He didn’t come into the world wanting to be a terrorist or aspiring to one day kill people, let alone children.
“As a teenager himself when he committed the offence, he was vulnerable to the malign influences that pray on our young people in today’s online world.
“The fact that he was heavily influenced by the perpetrator of one of the most horrific attacks this country has seen in recent times, is a terrifying indictment of the abhorrent commentary, hateful opinion and violent imagery that too many of our young people are exposed to via the myriad of online sites, chat forums, and gaming and social media platforms.”
He added: “I didn’t become a police officer to put teenagers in prison, it’s not something I want to be doing.
“But if they can access dangerous, highly addictive, and influential content, there is a very clear risk that it will destroy their young lives before they’ve really begun.
“Whilst I am hugely thankful to my team for halting a potential attack on young innocent lives; there are no winners today, just a sense of sadness that highlights the need for us as a society to grip this issue and finally stop our young people being exploited in this way.”
The Crown Prosecution Service said: “The evidence showed that he was fantasising, expressing violent thoughts, and seeking attention online, rather than making concrete plans or taking steps to carry out an attack.”
