Driven to Kill: The Murder of Levi Ernest-Morrison

A teenage boy. A knock at the door. And a mother who made a devastating choice.

In this episode, we tell the story of 17-year-old Levi Ernest-Morrison — a kind, funny, and thoughtful boy from Sydenham with a love of motorbikes, dreams of building a home in St Lucia, and a future ahead of him. Until the evening of 10th April 2021, when he was hunted down in the street by a group of teenagers wielding machetes — and never made it home.

This story was featured in the BBC series The Met: Policing London, and in this episode we explore the full context, including Levi’s life before the attack, the involvement of Ulysses, Sprules and others, and the devastating impact on a family left behind.

We also chat about the summer holidays, walking motivation (or the lack thereof), and attempt to design badges with predictably terrible results.

Because it’s Sinister South — and we will always balance the darkest stories with a little bit of nonsense and a lot of swearing.

Sources include 

https://www.met.police.uk/police-forces/metropolitan-police/areas/about-us/about-the-met/the-met/the-met-episode-one/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-63014582
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/levi-ernest-morrison-machete-stabbing-murder-sydenham-london-b1115715.html
https://southwarknews.co.uk/area/southwark/levi-ernest-morrison-fifth-arrest-made-by-police

Transcript

Hello. Hi. I'm Rachel.

I'm Hannah and this is Sinister South, your weekly treat that delves into the subversive, the sinister and the salacious in South London. I like salacious. Salacious is a good word.

Don't ask me to spell it. No. No.

Me either. No. It's going to be one of those.

It's just like, it'll be like my defiantly. Oh, I do everything defiantly. I would have been very easily caught out in line of duty.

I was going to say law and order then. I was like, that's the wrong, the wrong show, Rachel. Oh dear.

How are you? How am I? I am well, mate. I am well. I have had some time with the kids.

It's been nice. The summer holidays are in full swing. I'm not yet at the point where I want to kill them or me.

Okay, good. So we're still looking good. Positive.

Still got like five weeks to go, but we're, we're, we're starting strong. Starting strong. Yeah.

All good. All good. How are you? Yeah, fine.

Good. Working, walking, working, walking. Be careful how you pronounce all of those.

Ah, the triple. I've just been wanking, wanking, wanking. That's all it's been.

Water wall. Your mum listens to this. She knows.

Walking and working has been the agenda. Nice. Yeah.

It's my life now. Do you like a genuinely random question, but like, you know, I know that you like walking because you do it every day, but like, was there ever a point where you just went, why am I doing this? A couple of times when it's been like, when it was in the bleak midwinter, and it was pissing it down and it was dark and I was trying to fit it in. It was like, I'm walking around at half 10 at night being like, just got to get 1000 more steps in.

Like, what am I doing? Yeah. But I will hands down. So it's changed my life.

Yeah. So because it's like, that's the thing. My issue is like, I am in awe of your like, you've, you dedicated to doing it.

And now you've just done it. Like, I have the dedication of something that's really not dedicated when it comes to anything that's like your commitment to that sentence. Yeah, exactly.

When it comes to anything that is related to, like, my personal well being, yeah, I will be committed as all hell to, like my friends to my work, to my kids, the idea that I've got to commit to something that benefits me, absolutely not. Friender. Sorry, sorry, but I forgot myself there.

I think it's a couple of things. One, I knew that if I wasn't really strict about it, I would just never do it. So it wasn't optional.

It had to be done. Yeah. And two, after like the first maybe month where I was like, dragging myself out, right? It has now become something that if I don't do it, I get really negative.

Yeah, like, I really need it. Oh, well, I just wish I just don't seem to get any endorphins from moving. I feel like in a past life, I was a single celled amoeba.

Oh, just floating along. And it's that kind of positive mental attitude, and really beautiful self talk. That just makes me so confused by this.

I just I mean, we've spoken about it on the podcast before, like, I am just lazy. That is my you're not. You are and you're not.

Yeah, you're lazy in such weird ways. And then so hyperactive in other ways, that it just like, I find that really difficult to compute. Like you could work solidly for 12 hours.

Yeah. Whereas I do about 12 and a half minutes. I'm like, well, this is dull.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I think there is parts of it that are incredibly dull. But then yeah, that is the kind of like, I don't care.

I don't think my. It doesn't matter how wonderful I'd find something. Yeah.

I couldn't sit and do it continuously for a very long period of time. Yeah. Whereas you could because you're obsessed and you love it.

And all of that. It wouldn't matter if it was the best thing in the world to me. I'd be like, I don't want it.

I'm bored now. Yeah. Yeah.

I just wish I could. Yeah, just be nice if I could put that intense need to complete something into something that was actually beneficial. I tell you what, because I timed it today.

Yeah. You walk from here down round into that play into that park. I won't name it.

Yeah. Exactly where you live and the route of how to get here. By the way, your postcode is.

Yeah. But here, there, there to that park. Yeah.

Round the big loop round once and back, I reckon would be about 25, 27 minutes. Do it once a day. Okay.

That's it. That's all we've got to do. Okay.

And check in next week, Trevor's to see if she actually. How many times she's ever fucking done it. Oh, dear me.

Oh, it's, um, it's been a bit of a weird week. I think this week, my head is in a bizarre place. We have gone a little bit insane.

Oh, God. Yeah. In the tiny shed today.

Trevor's full disclosure. We have been in here for some time. Yeah.

And we were working on. Okay. Right.

So Patreon. We have one. And there are some lovely, lovely Trevor's who have paid for the additional content and the extra things that you get, which is great.

We kind of released it because we've been bitching about the fact that like, we'll hadn't done the episodes. So we couldn't do it. We landed, we make some promises.

Oh, yeah, we promised things. And then we realized that we actually had to fulfill them. And, and the episodes that we'll hadn't edited to, you know, I mean, in our defense, he hadn't edited them.

But the episodes that we'll edited that edited were just the tip of the iceberg. And we were not prepared. But we launched anyway, as I want.

And, and we've realized that quite a lot of you are meant to have pins. And I know we referenced this a while ago. And we said, Oh, if anyone's got any ideas, send us some pictures.

And none of you did. So we were like, Oh, shit, we should probably do something. But I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know what your graphic design skills are like. When I tell you that I love us.

Yeah, we're great. But fuck me when it comes to graphic design. Oh, my God.

I mean, I didn't realize quite how bad we were. Jesus Christ. I mean, we've come up with three options.

Yeah, two are very phoned in. Yeah. Look, I like the first one.

So do I. But it's just so random. Yeah, it's not our, it's not our strong suit. It's not our strong suit.

No, but we are thinking what we're going to do. We may have already done this before this episode comes out. It depends on how many ideas I run out of before we post things on Instagram.

But the plan is that we're going to put the three designs, she says in very large air quotes, up on Instagram and get you guys to vote for them. And the fourth option will be... The secret fourth option is designing yourself. And send us a picture of what you want.

Yeah. Because we, we're very happy to order them. We're very happy to get in contact.

And that's also not said with any division. It's not like, oh, design yourself then. It's like please design yourself.

If we have any artistic people out there who want to design us. Or autistic. I mean, we've got a lot.

But no, if there is anyone who's got any sort of artistic bone in their body, because apparently Hannah and I do not. If you could design us a pin that says Trevor's Detective Agency. No, Trevor's Neighbourhood Watch.

Fuck me, we've just spent about 14 hours doing this. You can't even remember. I was so busy worrying about the placement of the apostrophe.

Yeah, if you want to send us a design for a pin. I think that does speak volumes about us both is that we really were just like shove that picture on there. And then we both spent a good 10 minutes being like, yeah, but is that the right apostrophe? No, but hang on.

Is it possessive? Is Trevor in charge of this thing? Does Trevor own it? Is Trevor in it? We've decided Trevor owns it. Yes. That's where the apostrophe is.

It is his. But yeah, so if anyone wants to design a badge that says Trevor's Neighbourhood Watch, then please do and send it to us and we'll love you forever. But yeah, so that's where the delirium has come from, is us sitting and fiddling around with Canva, who we're not sponsored by, unfortunately.

But if they would like to give us some money, please go ahead. Do not be offended by our shoddy use of your tools. Maybe if Canva were to sponsor us, we could spend some money going to graphic design school.

There are so many things that you and I need to do to sort our lives out before we go to graphic design school. I don't think so. Rachel, I just announced I was wanking, wanking, wanking.

I think we both need therapy first. We do. We do.

Especially now that I no longer get to speak to my lovely Lisa. I know. I'm sad for you.

Very sad for me. She is jumping for joy. Oh, she's having the summer of her dreams.

She did say to me today, though, it's my last one, and she did say to me, Fuck off. So she said to him, she went, thank you, like we were talking, she was like, thank you for being so like, you know, committed to it. Because I'm apparently committed to self care that way.

But that's the only, only way. Use the time. Yeah.

Okay, fine. I'll use the time. But she said, thank you for being so committed and coming every week and blah, blah, blah.

And then she was like, you've made it really enjoyable. I've told my supervisor all about you. And I was like, I don't know that that's a good thing.

What have you said, Lisa? We've spoken about my anxiety disorder at length. You need to inform me. You shouldn't.

Now my summer is going to be spent fixating. Trying to find out who her supervisor is, tracking them down, befriending them. Yes.

Yeah, obviously. And saying, see, she's wrong. Although I did have to say to her, because there was one week that I missed, she was like, oh, are you feeling any better? And it was when I had laryngitis that came out of nowhere.

And then yeah, it was just a bit random. There was a day where I completely lost my voice. It wasn't just croaky.

It was gone. And I did say to her today, she was like, oh, that sounds awful. Are you feeling better? I was like, yeah, well, you know, I mean, for me, it is a bit of a hardship not to be able to hear myself.

It's like, I was really upset. I missed me. I missed me, yeah.

So it was fine. The inner monologue kept me going, that's all right. Oh, don't.

I don't think you realise how much you talk to yourself until someone else is in your space unexpectedly. So like, but whenever he's at home, from his, so like he works shift patterns or whatever. So if it's a work day for me and not for him, and he'll be in the other room and I'm like, he's like, what? I'm not talking to you.

I'll just go over here and do this. Are you talking to me? No, I'm still not talking to you. And then I'll be like, bitch.

Richard! He's like, what? I was talking to you. How am I meant to know the lyrics? To be fair, it is quite difficult. I think I've passed my love of my own voice down to my children, especially my youngest who has now, not only does she sleepwalk, she now, it's not even sleep talking.

It is sleep lecturing, which she started doing when she stayed over and my sister, who is a mental case, agreed to sleep in a tent with both of them in the garden in my mum's, at my mum's house, which meant that I got a lovely night of sleep because Will was working, so he wasn't there. I was in my own bed. It was a double, it wasn't a king, I'm not, you know, but it was a double bed, all of my own, without any small people crawling in and kicking me, without my husband snoring.

He will say I snore louder, but that's to be decided. And like, just, it was blissful. But apparently, my sister did say the next day, she was like, um, you know your daughter? So yeah, I'm aware of her, yeah.

Fairly familiar. Fair a few times. Do you know she talks in her sleep? A lot.

So it's not great when you're outside in the middle of the night, you can hear foxes going because my parents' garden backs onto a park. So they are, the noise is erratic. And then suddenly you just get her being like, no, Auntie Bee, I don't think that's the right way to go.

But yeah, no, she does. She, she has full on conversations with I don't know who, someone in her sleep. I used to sleep talk.

Did you? Quite a lot. I haven't done it for, I don't think I've done it for ages. I, I know that I, I sleep scream.

Of course, because that is exactly what you would do. No, I have the amount of times I've either woken myself up, or will has shaken. Because I, I don't, they're not night terrors, because they're not like, and I don't get sleep paralysis or anything like that.

My sister gets sleep paralysis. Horrible. It's not not fun.

Yeah, if I could have really, really vivid nightmares. And I don't think that there maybe she's born with it. Maybe it's certainly is helping.

But we have other graces that we thank her for. So I can have really, really, really vivid nightmares. And the amount of times that like in my nightmare, I'm trying to scream.

And you know, have you ever had a dream where it's like, you need to scream, but you can't? Yeah, it doesn't work. Well, apparently, no. In real life, I'm actually screaming.

I've done that a couple of times once, right? In my I did. I say sleep paralysis, but it wasn't like there was no demon. It wasn't that.

I think the way other people describe it when they have it is like so horrific. I don't want to belittle it with comparing this to it. Yeah.

But I was unable to move. And I don't know whether I was well, I knew I didn't know I was dreaming. Right.

Okay. A cat came through the window. Not one of mine is before I had cats.

Right. And I just remember like, being like, there's a cat and I couldn't move. And I apparently I was screaming my head off then.

Yeah, it's like, um, do you watch do you ever follow? I don't know that she's your type of content creator. There's a girl, a Canadian woman, and she goes by Selena spooky boo. Is she the one that does the sleepwalking? Yes, I have seen absolutely hilarious.

Like, it's my husband. Poor husband. He just cracks up, doesn't he? Oh, yeah, no, I am starting to think that maybe like, at some point, I'll just do an audio recording and just see what I chat about.

But then I'm also terrified that something else that will come. Although I don't know, like, I think I'm all right to record mine because I've had two dreams recently, which have been a variation on a theme, which is I'm in charge of large quantities of fish orders from Billingsgate market to different people. One, I don't remember the first one, like who it was for or whatever.

It was just a large quantity of fish. And I was, I was in charge of the order. I like, like making sure the navigation for the delivery was right and all of this.

But I do know that the second one was for Kate Lawler off of Big Brother fame. Yeah, I was in charge of her large fish order. Brains are fucking mental.

Brains are mad. They really are mad. Yeah, I've had a lot of, I've got this weird, I think I might have said this on the podcast before.

I apologise if I have. But I have this weird thing where it's like, I will have, I started having loads of recurring dreams. But it's like the story, if you like, of the dream is different.

But all the setting is exactly the same. So it's like, there's a house, the house is exactly the same house every single time. There is always because I apparently I am.

I don't know who I think I am, but there is a swimming pool on the top floor. There's a massive swimming pool on the top floor. And there's like about 80 different rooms.

And like one of the hallways, one of the stairs to get up to the rooms looks like the hallway in my old house. It's all very funny. But like, and it's always the exact same.

Like even the outside is the same. Everything is the same. But the story that happens in it is completely different.

But it's like, I can visualise it so well. Even with my like, when I'm not asleep. Like I could, I could do a floor plan of this house.

But it's mad because it's always, I think that I love about it is I always know that those dreams are going to be good dreams because, and this is going to be really sad to say, but no, because my nan, who passed away a couple of years ago, who was absolutely bloody epic, and I miss her very much. But she always, without fail, in that dream, she's only ever in it for like a really brief moment. She's sat on a sun lounger.

Nice. In her Marks and Sparks skirt. And she's drinking an arches and lemonade, because that was her drink.

And she's just chilling and living her best life in every single dream. Amazing. I'm like, I swear I only saw my nan drink like a handful of times.

But yet in the dream, there she is, arches and lemonade on a sun lounger. Do you know what I just realised? What? We've got a captive audience. What? Can anybody... Not here.

I was just like, don't tell me we've been talking about night terrors. There's four people at the window, mate. Did you see my face? Yes.

That was almost as good as when we were talking about the Louis Theroux documentary, and I said the title of it, which is Can I tell you a secret? And you go, yeah. Look, don't do jump scares at me. No, I won't go into the whole backstory of it.

But can someone get in touch with me, Trevor's, if anyone knows a Roy Dobson? Anyone knows someone called Roy Dobson? Can they get in touch? Because I'd just like to have a really brief conversation. I like, I'll explain it. If it ever comes to light, but I just don't want to jinx it otherwise.

Yeah, fair. But if anyone knows a Roy Dobson, because I certainly don't. Also, maybe check in on them.

Oh, dear. Right. Have we done enough waffle? I think so.

Oh, dear. As I say, Trevor's, it's been a bit of a day. You are going to tell me a story.

I am indeed. And I'm going to vape and listen. Yep, you are.

That's your want. That is my want. I love it.

Yes, I am doing a story today. This is one that some of the Trevors will probably have heard, especially if you like me, watch The Met, the BBC documentary, because it was featured on a recent season of that. As usual, all of the references will be in the show notes.

There we go. She's good, isn't she? Yeah, all the references will be in the show notes, it'll be up on the website, SinisterSouthPod.co.uk and yeah, trigger warning. It's not nice.

So just yeah, and it's sad because it's young people. Anyway, right, we ready? I think so. OK, it started like so many tragedies do with something small, a knock at the door, a teenage rivalry, a few angry words exchanged between boys.

But by the end of that Saturday evening in April 2021, 17 year old Levi Ernest Morrison was lying on a pavement in Sydenham, bleeding from a stab wound so severe that not even paramedics or an air ambulance could save him. He died just yards from his home. Levi's murder shook his community and baffled detectives.

He wasn't part of a gang. He wasn't carrying a knife. He had nerve damage from a childhood accident and walked with a crutch.

He couldn't run fast. He'd never stood a chance. This is a story of what happened to Levi.

The hours leading up to the attack, the police investigation that followed and the shocking discovery of who was involved. It's a case so disturbing it was featured on the BBC's The Met's Policing London, a documentary series that follows detectives as they uncover the truth behind some of the city's most serious crimes. And if you haven't seen it, I recommend you go and watch it because it is very good.

And in this case, the truth was more shocking than anyone could have imagined. But before we talk about the investigation, the court case and the people responsible, we need to first talk about Levi. Levi was 17 and lived in Sydenham with his mum and siblings.

He wasn't someone who caused trouble, not by anyone's account. In fact, the people who knew him best described him as kind, caring and always smiling. His mum called him thoughtful.

His sister said he had a heart that was soft and gentle. When a neighbour collapsed, Levi was the one who stayed calm and helped to save her life. When another needed help with their garden, Levi turned up with his tools and quietly got on with it.

He loved St Lucia, where his family had roots. And he dreamed of building a house there one day, not just for himself, but for his whole family. He was good with his hands, already doing construction work and already thinking about the future and looking to do an apprenticeship in construction once he'd left school.

Levi was autistic. He also had foot drop, which is a nerve condition in his leg that meant he couldn't lift his foot properly. It was a lasting injury from a serious road accident that he'd had when he was younger that broke his ribs and hip, crushed his lungs, shattered his femur and almost killed him.

Doctors said he was lucky to survive. But he did. He used a crutch sometimes to walk and his right foot dragged slightly when he ran, if he ever ran.

But he didn't complain. He didn't want to be treated differently. And he told his mum once, I just want to be independent.

That mattered to him. Levi spent time with the Kaleidoscope Group in Lewisham, which is a support organisation for young people with additional needs. And there he was part of organised trips.

And him and his family got access to a number of different services, which supported Levi throughout his teenage years. His vulnerabilities on the surface made him quite an easy target. But they also made him much more compassionate and aware.

He was the kind of person who'd tell you not to step on an ant. That's God's creature, he'd say. He loved animals.

He loved anything with wheels or engines, bikes especially. And if a motorbike went past, Levi's head would turn before he'd even finished the sentence. He could ride a two-wheeler before he was three.

Wow. His mum says he was speaking in full sentences by the time he was one. He was cheeky, curious and bold, climbing things other parents wouldn't dream of letting their kids near.

His mum said people would say, Whose child is that at the park? Mine, I'd say, trying not to laugh. That's Levi. She didn't want him to be afraid of the world.

She did everything she could to understand him. His autism, his ADHD, his needs. She read, researched, adjusted because she knew he was different.

But she knew that he was also special. Levi had five siblings and a very strong sense of family. He was close to his stepdad, Chris.

His little brother and sister adored him. And at bedtime, apparently, and this is heartbreaking, they still say goodnight to the stars. And they try and figure out which one is Levi.

And Levi absolutely loved his mum. There's a home video of him speaking and this is on the Met. And it is heartbreaking.

You can also see it on YouTube. There's a home video of him speaking to the camera. It was for a competition.

I think it was like Parent of the Year or something. Okay. And you had to do a video explaining why your parent was Parent of the Year.

And he'd done one for his mum. And it's just him in his bedroom. And he says, quote, I'm Levi and I'm a third child.

And I think my mum should be Mother of the Year because she's always had my back. She's always been with me through hard times. She's been with me every step of the way throughout the whole of my life.

There is absolutely zero bravado in the clip. There's no performance. He is just telling the world that he loves his mum.

And it's incredibly heartwarming and also heartbreaking. So on Saturday, the 10th of April 2021, Levi left his home in Sydenham in the early evening. He'd asked his mum for a tenner to go to the shops.

And the plan was to meet a friend. And then they were going to possibly head to another friend's house. And then he was going to be home after that.

He was only going a short distance, just a few minutes from his front door. And he hadn't taken his crutch that day, which apparently wasn't particularly unusual because he would only use it when he really had to. He wasn't going far.

Exactly. Now, earlier that same day, and this is where it gets a little bit complicated. So bear with me.

Earlier the same day, a group of Levi's acquaintances and other local boys who Levi knew and was friends with, but Levi wasn't involved in this. So he knew the people who were, but he wasn't there. These acquaintances and other local boys had gone to the home of a teenager that they had some conflict with.

And I'm going to get into what that conflict was in a bit. They knocked on the door of this boy's house multiple times trying to confront him. And apparently they were quite aggressive.

They were quite intimidating, but they weren't violent. They weren't trying to break in. None of them had any weapons.

They were just hammering on the door, basically. Still aggressive. And it is still a bit intimidating.

Yeah, but not, exactly, not violent. The teenager who lived there, his mum was home. The teenager wasn't at the time.

And she saw this, and to be fair to her, rightly so, she was frustrated by what was going on and she saw it as harassment. And so she made a phone call to the police and she made a statement to the police operator that was, quote, if they come back, I'm going to batter them. The police obviously said that they would be like, don't do that.

And let us know if they come back. Because I think by this point they had left. They said, let us know if they come back.

And if they do, we'll come round. But she decided that she wasn't going to wait for them. And instead, she called her son.

And we'll get into who her son is in a minute. So Levi had known people on both sides of the dispute since childhood. They'd grown up in the same area.

He'd attended the same school as some of them. But he was not involved in the confrontation. So he wasn't there doing anything.

He was completely independent to it. He just happened to know the people who were involved. At approximately 7.20pm, Levi and another friend, who I don't have the info for, but they were walking along Sydenham Road near the junction with Hazel Grove.

Now, CCTV and eyewitness reports confirm that a red Suzuki Vetera four by four had been driving around the area with passengers that eyewitnesses stated were carrying weapons. And it looked as though they were looking for a confrontation. Soon, they pulled up nearby to Levi and this friend.

And four teenagers, all in dark clothing and masks, got out of the vehicle. They were carrying knives and machetes. Two of the attackers targeted Levi's friend, while two of them chased Levi himself.

But because of his mobility issues, Levi was unable to run fast enough to escape. One of the boys swung a machete at him, causing him to stumble. A second boy caught up with Levi and stabbed him once in the groin area, severing a major blood vessel.

The attackers then returned to the vehicle and fled the scene. The attack lasted less than 30 seconds. A passerby and nearby residents rushed to help.

Emergency services were called, including an air ambulance. And Levi's mum arrived on foot minutes later, having been alerted by neighbours who had seen him on the ground. Because genuinely, he was so close to home, it's ridiculous.

She held him as he lay on the pavement and she told him that she loved him. Despite efforts by paramedics, Levi was pronounced dead at the scene at approximately 8pm. He died just yards from his own home.

The post-mortem took place the following Monday, on the 12th of April 2021, and the findings were devastating. A single stab wound to Levi's groin had caused a catastrophic internal bleed. The blade had pierced deep muscle and severed vital vessels.

And the injury was fatal and fast. And according to the coroner, there was nothing that could have been done to save him once that wound was inflicted. The investigation into Levi's murder began within minutes of the 999 call that was placed very quickly after the incident.

And officers from the Met were dispatched to the scene. And by the time that Levi was formally declared deceased, a full-scale murder inquiry was already underway by the Met's Specialist Crime Command. Levi had been attacked in a public place, on a residential street in Sydenham, just a few feet from his family home.

CCTV cameras, vehicle recognition systems and dashcam footage were immediately reviewed to identify any people, vehicles or other evidence that may have been involved. The first breakthrough came quickly. That Suzuki was traced via ANPR to the home of Nicola Leighton in Sydenham.

Detectives secured CCTV from her house and nearby streets. Now, who was Nicola Leighton? I'm just going to do a quick bit of her. There's not a huge amount of info about any of the people in this case.

Okay. Levi is obviously the one that's spoken about most and rightly so. But I was trying to find history on any of the others.

And it's a weird one. Some of it is because of the ages. I was going to say, is it because they... Some of it is, but not all of it.

A lot of it is just that there was no criminal history before this. So there isn't a huge amount out there about them. So I've gone with what I could find.

But yeah, there isn't a huge amount. So Nicola Leighton lived in Sydenham at the time of this incident. And she was a mother of three.

As I say, she was not known to police before the incident and has had no significant criminal record. Media reports at the time identified her as having been a care home manager or at least working in that sector in some way. She came across to the public and to neighbours as just an ordinary mum.

She was publicly upset in interviews about the case. And police said that there was nothing to show that she was involved in any gang activity, which at the time was the initial investigative line. But it was her car? Yeah.

OK. So they originally assumed that this was a gang related murder or some sort of gang hit. And that was the route that they went down.

But they quickly found that actually it wasn't. What they did find was that at the later court case, spoiler, the prosecution noted that there had been some links between the attackers and the LDG gang in Sydenham. But apparently they were fairly tenuous.

It's kind of like as much of a link as one of them went to school with one of them, rather than actually them being involved in any sort of gang activity. Leighton's role in the case was unusual and really quite disturbing. She became the adult instigator of a fatal attack carried out by her teenage son and his friends.

Rather than trying to de-escalate the situation, she actively escalated it. After the group of teenagers had repeatedly knocked on her door earlier in the day, she became enraged. And instead of waiting for the police or calling them back, she called her son and urged him to take action.

Now, her son, at the time of sentencing, he was 19, but at the time of the incident, he was 17. He was named, or he is named Tyrese Ulysses. And he had a history of violent behaviour.

At the time of Levi's murder, he was actually under investigation for a string of robberies on the Docklands Light Railway, the DLR, from the previous year. Now, these were violent robberies where he was attacking people. He was basically holding machetes to them.

Jesus Christ. And then that case, it later came to court and it led to an eight-year sentence for Tyrese. Right.

Okay. So, yeah, he had form. Yeah.

Whether his mum knew about those attacks, I mean, I would imagine that she probably knew something if he's under investigation, but who knows. But in this case, so the case against Levi, after receiving a phone call from his mum, Tyrese gathered a group of friends and it was described in court as him rallying the troops. And this group included teenagers from age 14 to age 17.

So young. It's ridiculous. And then Leighton, so his mum, drove them around Sydenham to locate the boys who had come to her house earlier.

So they'd purposely gone out looking for them. Roughly six hours before the attack, a new CCTV system had been installed at Leighton's home. And the footage from this system captured four teenagers, including her son, gathering outside her home before the incident.

They were seen then getting into her car with weapons, which are apparently very visible, and then later returning in the same car to the same building after the stabbing had taken place. Now, it is mental that she'd had this CCTV installed the same day that all of this happened. It's just like, I mean, in some ways it's serendipitous.

I don't think she thinks it, but you know. The footage that was taken from that CCTV system not only linked Leighton's car directly to the crime, it also showed that she had personally driven the attackers to and from the scene. Fucking hell.

And it's reported that once Levi was down, the teenagers returned to the car and Leighton sped away. So she knew that something had happened. She later claimed that she didn't know that the boys were armed, which is very difficult to believe when it said that they each had a machete.

Yeah. It's like, I think machetes are quite difficult to hide, I would think. Okay, love, whatever.

In a small Suzuki 4x4, but anyway. Detectives now had cause to believe that Levi's murder was not just the result of a spontaneous confrontation between teenagers, but a planned retaliatory attack facilitated and enabled by an adult. Investigators matched phone call logs with movements.

Leighton had called Tyrese after the door knocking incident, while Tyrese communicated with his mates coordinating the quote unquote ride out, which he did via WhatsApp and Snapchat. And this call timeline supported the prosecution's assertion that Leighton had actively orchestrated the mission. Locals provided witness accounts confirming the timeline.

Paramedics and forensics detectives collected blood samples, knife sheaths and swabs, and specialists at the scene tied the injuries to machete type weapons and confirmed that Levi's disability, like they confirmed that he had one. Yeah. But basically we're saying that like, this was why he couldn't escape what was happening to him.

Nicola Leighton was arrested the next day on Sunday, the 11th of April on suspicion of murder. During her police interview, she initially denied any involvement, but when she was shown the CCTV footage from her own home, I was gonna say. She broke down and at that point she began giving names, though notably she left out the name of her son, but she did state, I need you to know who did it.

So trying to remove herself from any sort of culpability, which is just mad, but there we go. The investigation was now centred on five key individuals. So Nicola Leighton, the driver, her then 17-year-old son, Tyrese Ulysses, and three other teenage boys who were aged 14, 16 and 17.

And then the next week, four teenagers, Tyrese Ulysses, Alex Sprules, a 16-year-old from Bromley and a 14-year-old who won't be named, were arrested and charged with murder, manslaughter and weapon possession based on their varying levels of involvement. Southwark News later reported the arrest of another 18-year-old who was connected to the case on April the 21st of 2021. Reports suggest that he may have been linked to the messages from Ulysses and possibly provided witness testimony or background context to what was going on, but there was no solid indication of him actually being involved and he was ultimately not charged with anything.

So working quickly, the Met's homicide team reviewed additional CCTV, all the mobile phone data from these five individuals and witness statements, and they were able to piece together the movements of the group before, during and after the attack. The 17-year-old who was later identified as Alex Sprules, he lived in Lewisham and was confirmed to be the person who had inflicted the fatal stab wound to Levi. Alex was reportedly very close to Ulysses to the point where he was described as being a second son to Nicola Leighton.

He had no prior offences publicly reported before the stabbing. The 16-year-old who couldn't be named due to legal restrictions on identifying minors was from the Bromley area. He had no familial connection to Leighton or Ulysses, but he was, it's believed, recruited by Ulysses as part of this retaliatory group.

But it's said that he, again, had no prior convictions and had reportedly, this is the only thing I could find about him, had reportedly dropped out of mainstream education. And it's believed that he was responsible for the initial swing of a machete, which is what caused Levi to fall over, which is then what allowed him to be stabbed. So why did all of this happen? We've hinted at this door knocking situation, which, as I say, don't get me wrong, was probably incredibly annoying.

But, you know. So this is the most ridiculous thing that I think I've heard in quite a long time to be the reason for somebody losing their life. This wasn't a drug deal gone wrong.

It wasn't gang warfare. It wasn't about money or territory. It all started because of a video on Snapchat.

Earlier in the day that Levi was killed, a short clip had been circulating on Snapchat between this kind of group of boys who all, as I say, all knew each other. They knew each other. They had some interconnected... They knew each other from wherever, but they'd kind of... It said in a lot of places that they had grown up together, but that they'd kind of, as they'd gotten older, they'd kind of, there'd been some rivalries over some girls or over some other bit.

And it just kind of escalated to the point where now they were kind of this, these two fragmented groups. Yeah. And yeah, this video was a taunting or mocking video, according to the prosecution, that was filmed by Tyrese Ulysses and Alex Sprawl.

And it targeted the group of teenagers that Tyrese had, as I say, had once been friends with, but was no longer friendly with. And in the video, Tyrese Ulysses is seen to be goading them and allegedly laughing at their... Apparently they'd tried to intimidate him before and he was trying to basically... It was a lot of flexing and being, I'm going to say it, stupid teenage boys. And then, as I put here, in the hypersensitive world of teenage boys and social media, that kind of ridicule was taken seriously.

So this is what prompted that group of boys to turn up at Leighton's house, where they were trying to be intimidating and they were trying to make a scene and they were trying to save face. Because apparently that's what teenage boys think they need to do. And this is what caused those teenagers and one of their mums to get into the car and go looking for them.

The group who ended up killing Levi didn't even know whether Levi had been part of the group or not. But it said that one of them had recognised his friend that he was with, but not Levi. So they'd recognised his friend, that's why they got out.

And then Levi ended up being collateral damage, basically. And evidence had shown that Levi wasn't at the scene when the knocking had been happening. But because he was friends with some of the boys that were involved in that, that meant that he was fair game as far as these lads were concerned.

It's so stupid. It is so stupid. So in December of 2021, all parties to trial at the Old Bailey.

The case was prosecuted under joint enterprise, which means that all parties could be held responsible for the murder, regardless of who dealt the fatal blow. And for detectives, it wasn't just the brutality of the attack that really kind of hit home. It was the fact that a mother had driven her own son and others to commit it.

Detective Chief Inspector Chris Wood, who led the inquiry later said, quote, I have never seen a case where a mother has driven her son and others to commit an offence like this. It was a targeted premeditated attack. The prosecution, led by Bill Emlyn Jones Casey, painted a picture of premeditated and coordinated violence.

Quote, that evening when Levi and the others came knocking on her door, although Levi wasn't there, so I think that that's a misspoke, misspeak. Yeah, he didn't mean to say it. Nicola Layton was furious.

She rang the police, told the police that if the boys came back, she was going to batter them. But before she had phoned police, she contacted Tyrese Ulysses and then he rallied the troops. The prosecutor also emphasised the speed and brutality of the attack, remarking that in just under 30 seconds, Levi's life was over.

CPS counsel Julius Capon later remarked, quote, this was a vicious attack on a teenager which was orchestrated by a mother who drove her son and his friends. Nicola Layton should have known better. Now she and her son will have to live with the consequences of their actions.

But Layton's defence argued that she had no idea the boys were armed. She says... I know. It said that she admitted that she drove them, but she insisted she thought that they were only going to scare Levi, not kill him, and again denied knowing that there were any weapons at all.

On the witness stand, it said that she broke down and admitted that she had lied under police questioning. And her own lawyers suggested that she had panicked, not plotted. But I would question that.

I can understand... You're still the grown up in the situation. Exactly. And I can understand being like, if you've got a group of teenagers being rowdy and hammering on your door and trying to intimidate you.

I mean, I'd be terrified. Yeah, it is scary. But the panic is then, and you call the police, you don't go out looking for... And you're the voice of reason.

If you do tell your son, you're the person that's like, no, obviously we're not going to drive around looking for them. Yeah. But I just wanted you to know, like, can you be here? Because I want to be on my own.

Or like... Can you sort out whatever this is? Can you just cut the shit that's going on? Can this just stop? Yeah. No. That was not what she did.

Jump in my shit car and let's go for a fucking ride. I know. It's mad.

Tyrese Ulysses' defence... I have no idea if it's a shit car. I don't know anything about cars. No, it's a Suzuki.

Tyrese Ulysses' defence focused on intent. So his barrister claimed that Tyrese didn't think that anyone would get seriously hurt, let alone killed. And yet you're running around with a machete.

And then... Was it foam? Was it foam? Honestly, I don't know. One of the defendants had said that they thought that the machetes were just to warn them and to scare them and to be intimidating, saying, I didn't know we were going to Hazel Grove. I thought we were just going to scare him.

Alex Sprules, who was defended by Christopher Henley, KC, denied delivering the fatal wound and claimed that he had not used the machete or inflicted any injury. And he stated that he believed others were responsible for the stabbing, but he would not name that person or persons. And then the 16-year-old defendant who was defended by Caroline Carberry, KC, when he was asked why he swung a machete towards Levi and his friend, he again said that it was to warn him off.

Warn him off, quote, I left believing the intention was only to scare Levi. He was then identified. This is a random side note.

OK. He was identified as a victim of modern slavery and childhood neglect during sentencing. Oh, wow.

But there was literally nothing else because of his age. I could not find anything else about him. It's literally just a random footnote in all of the reports, which is baffling.

And yeah, the barristers apparently did spend a bit of time trying to say that this was a mitigating circumstance, that he'd been, you know, and, you know, like fine being neglected by parents and all of that. Like I can see, but it's still as far as I'm concerned, doesn't give you a right to kill someone. And luckily, the court agreed with me and said that they found all five guilty in some way to the killing.

So Nicola Layton was found guilty of murder. She was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 23 years. Tyrese Ulysses was convicted of manslaughter.

He received 13 years in custody and five years on license. Alex Sprouls and the 16-year-old boy were both found guilty of murder and sentenced to life with minimum terms of 20 and 16 years, respectively. The 14-year-old who was in the car admitted guilt to manslaughter and he was sentenced to six years and three months in custody.

Now, nothing is known about him because of his age. Judge Peter Rook Casey described the case as having, quote, truly grave offences, a brutal overreaction to a very small problem. The immediate trigger was the appearance of a rival gang attending Nicola Layton's address, a reaction to a taunting video.

He further noted the scourge of knife crime in the capital, specifically in the south of London, describing the incident as reflective of, quote, gang rivalry slipping into lethal violence. Now, this is very interesting terminology because the police were very, they were almost at pains to say that it wasn't gang-related. Now, whether the judge in this case is using the word gang to mean a collective rather than an organised... It was group violence.

Yes, rather than an organised gang of people. It just felt a bit weird that, like, there seemed to be a few inconsistencies between what the police were saying and then what the judge was saying, which I found a bit bizarre. But I can only assume that, yeah, he meant gang in the term.

A gang of people rather than an organised group. Exactly. Outside the courtroom, Levi's mum, Bonnie Ernest Blake, spoke of her devastation of losing her son.

Quote, I feel like I'm in a horror film I cannot get out of. Levi was caring, trustworthy, always smiling. To know that a mother could do this and bring her own child into it is something I will never understand.

Bonnie attended the trial throughout and after sentencing in January of 2022, she was photographed outside the Old Bailey with her husband, Christopher Blake, Levi's stepdad, offering visible support for the family. She appears in the BBC's The Met, which is from October of 2023, if anyone wants to go and watch it. And she speaks very emotionally about Levi and she grants permission for filmmakers to include that video of him not being there.

to her for nominating her for Mother of the Year, as a tribute to him, to kind of show what a cute, sweet kid he was. And since the trial, Bonnie has continued to speak publicly about the dangers of knife crime, calling for community intervention and more support for vulnerable teens. She's become a quiet but powerful voice in the movement to prevent further loss of teenagers in and around her local area and again, specifically across London.

This case wasn't just about knives or misguided teenage bravado, but more about adults 100% failing the children that they are around. There is real blurred lines between this provocation and where does the parenting brain take over and the devastating consequences when revenge takes the wheel quite literally in this case. At the trial, Levi's mum said, quote, Levi had a whole life ahead of him.

He was robbed of that and we were robbed of him. The streets of Sydenham will recover. Courtroom transcripts will fade from the headlines.

But for Bonnie, for Levi's younger siblings and for those who knew him, this loss is permanent and could have been completely prevented. Oh, yes, good Lord. So that's the sad case of Levi Ernest Morrison and he is like genuinely, if you go and watch the Met, he was 17 at the time of this and if you ignore any of the difficulties that he had, I'm not mitigating, I'm not kind of trying to minimise them, but he's just, he's a young lad.

He's just a normal boy going about his normal life and he gets caught up in this ridiculous melee on the streets of residential Sydenham. And the thing that chills me is the fact that it's a machete. Oh, God, yeah.

It's the same to me as like, it's the same sort of horror movie vibes as like when you hear about someone being attacked with an axe. Yeah, of course. It's just, it's all so, just so avoidable.

It's so unnecessary. Like, I mean, her being the adult, her being a parent, like take, if you could just take that out of it for a second and just have teenage boys on teenage boys being fucking idiots. It just feels like at every step it was preventable.

Yeah. Like, why, why take the additional flight if you're just trying to intimidate? Why take the additional step of swinging the machete so that Levi fell over? Yeah. If you're just intimidating, why take the initial step of actually fucking stabbing him? Yeah, exactly.

Why? I'm sorry. But if you take any, like, just the rest of the unnecessariness out of it, those two actions, completely unnecessary, completely preventable, completely. Yeah.

It is ridiculous. And it's the, it's, I'm sorry. I'm going to say, you know, it might be a controversial thing, but if you are trying to intimidate someone, you don't need a weapon to intimidate.

You don't need a weapon of that magnitude. You don't need, you don't need a weapon at all. You don't.

Like you can intimidate someone. Especially considering they came to the door without weapons. Yeah.

So they were not armed at all. And they've got evidence to say that, like, literally, yeah, they were being little shits and they were trying to be intimidating and they were trying to be aggressive. And a hundred percent.

And I would, I don't know what I would do faced with a group of, you know, like four or five teenage lads who are quite obviously pissed off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Gunning for what I would assume is a punch up.

And yeah, like, yeah. You know, it is scary. And I think that she was well within her right to call the police.

She was well within her right to try and get help for the situation. Where she crossed the fucking line is thinking that it was fine to essentially be the taxi driver. Or to put your child in a car and be like, come on then.

It's madness. What the fuck? Yeah. And you just think that, like, it's almost like I don't know anything other than what I've just told you about Tyrese Ulysses.

But there is something that just makes you go, if your mother is enabling that behaviour, encouraging, egging you on in some way, you never stood a fucking chance. And I know that we said about the, you know, machete attacks. And if it hadn't been him, it would have been the next young boy they saw.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, it would have been.

A hundred percent it would have been. Someone was like, something was going to happen. They were gunning for something to happen.

And it's just so upsetting that Levi had absolutely nothing to do with it. He was completely innocent. And he was literally minutes away from his home.

So, I mean, the only, I don't think it's not a saving grace at all, but the fact that his mum was with him, was able to get to him. Yeah. I think, yeah.

But it's not a saving grace. No, but I know what you mean. It's just.

Yeah. The absolute carnage that comes off of someone. And it just, what annoys me about cases like this, and I suppose with all kind of, in a way, in all gang violence, and even though this wasn't that, but in all of this kind of, whenever you get someone who's just like, oh, I've got to go and like, it's trying to save face.

Save face from what? Yeah. Like no one cares. And I get that when you're 17.

You can't see that. But it's like, if you could just turn around to them, if there was somebody who exactly, as you've said, like if his mum had been like, well, no, don't be an idiot. We're not going out looking for them.

Obviously not. Like if there had been that kind of. Voice of reason.

There'd been a fucking grown up in the room. Yeah, exactly. It's just, it's astounding.

I just, I mean, there's, yeah. It just absolutely beggars belief. I just, I'm like, at what point were you a parent? Yeah.

Like you weren't a parent that day. You weren't. You weren't a fucking adult that day.

What, what the fuck? No, it is. It is ridiculous. Although I do think that it's also like the fact that she confesses only when she realises she's been caught.

By her own fucking CCTV. What did you think? They weren't going to find it. It's just fucking idiot.

And it's like, oh no, I didn't know that the, I didn't know they were armed. Okay. But all four of them get into the car with machetes.

Like it's just, also, can I just ask a question? Yeah. Why does one need a machete in South London? I don't know why you're asking me. But I'm just like, I can't even.

I know, I'm joking. Like what, I don't, I mean, I get it if you're like in a jungly environment and you need to clear brush. Ah, jungly.

Yes, yes, yes. But you know, if you've got some brush to clear, you know, that makes sense to me. But why do you need one in South London? You don't? For intimidation? It's just like.

To do exactly what. Yeah. You know, like exactly what it looks like.

My knife's bigger than your knife. Yeah, no, seriously. No, no, I'm sorry.

Didn't mean to rile you up. Very sorry. But yes, I would say that if anyone wants to find out or like see who these people are.

Sure, just to see the video of Levi. Yeah, yeah, it's very cute. It's very, I mean, I will trigger warning.

There is CCTV footage of him being chased, which is hard to watch. Yeah. But one thing I will say is the speed at which people come to his aid after it's happened is quite.

Some restoration of humanity. Yeah, there's a little bit of. Because the boys, they do it and then they leg it.

They absolutely leg it. And back to mummy. Yeah, of course it is.

But yeah, there is a lot of quick response from passersby, which does kind of help the belief that not everyone is an arse. But yeah, and it's just devastating to think that it doesn't matter how quick people have got to him. It didn't matter how quick the air ambulance got to him.

He was never going to make it after that attack. It's just, oh, mate. So my final thing to say on this is as I'm going to put my mummy hat on again.

I know I did it on a floating head the other week, but for the love of fucking Christ, just look out for each other. And just don't, nothing, nothing, no slight, no crossword, no someone talking behind your back. Your reputation is never going to be damaged beyond repair, regardless of what anybody says.

You will only reputationally destroy yourself if you do something fucking stupid like this. Exactly. And I know that our Trevors are not the type of people that we need to be saying this to.

Who are we talking to? Can everybody put their machetes down, please? Can all the middle-aged white women who listen to us just stop it now. They're very young, actually. They are very young.

Very hip. We're very hip and cool. But no, but yeah, it's just devastating that yet again.

And, you know, I think the unfortunate thing is that as long as we continue to do this podcast, as long as we continue to focus on South London crime, this will not be the last time that we do a case that ends like this or that involves this sort of violence, unfortunately. And it's just, that's just incredibly sad. I mean, very well done, darling.

Thank you very much. Thank you, you're welcome. Should we do the nice things? Yeah, I'm sad now.

Okay, I'm sorry. Let's do the nice things. I'm angry and sad.

We have a website. It is sinistersouthpod.co.uk. Correct. We have an email address, which is sinistersouthpodcast.gmail.com. We have the TikTok and Instagram, both of which can be found under Sinister South Pod.

Well done. We have the Facebook group run by the lovely or not Lou, which is Trevor's Unite. There's the Patreon, the one I always forget, which I think if you just go to Patreon and search Sinister South, you'll find us.

We're going to be ordering some fucking badges at some point. So get in while the going's good. Indeedy, indeedy.

And that's that. Coming soon will be the promised shout out on the pod for those Patreon people, which I think I've said to Rach, I'm just going to hugely plagiarise Three Bean Salad podcast, but put a Sinister South spin on it somehow. Love it.

And that's my plan for that, because I thought I'd better do some kind of admin for this podcast. I'm very excited to hear, very excited. So yeah, so look out for that.

The other thing to say just before we go is that we will be doing a bit of a summer hiatus. Yes. When we say hiatus, that sounds like a very like... I think we said this last episode, over-egging the pudding there.

No, we're going to have a couple of weeks off for summer. Exactly. So just prepare yourself for that.

I think you've got two more weeks left now. Yeah. Before the break.

Two or three, one of them, yeah. Something like that. And then we'll have two weeks off and then we'll be back at the start of September.

And that is just to... Back to school. Back to school, back to the murder. It'll all be fine.

It's mainly just so that... Will can catch up. Will can catch up. So yeah, so we'll do that, but we'll keep you posted on all of it.

And of course, as per usual, we love you and take care. Take care, guys. We love you.

I kind of want to do that, is it Jerry Springer? Take care of yourself and each other. Oh dear. Right, I'm going to bed.

Yeah, it's bedtime. We love you, goodbye. Goodbye.