Teenage knife-murderer's history of carrying blades

A RAPPER who stabbed a teenager to death had previously taken part in a 'knife crime prevention programme' and sung about 'extreme knife violence, a court heard. King Sibanda, 17, murdered Abdikarim Abdalla Ahmed on a Friday afternoon in Bury town centre near a busy shopping centre.

- ANDREW BARDSLEY

Sibanda knifed the 18-year-old after Mr Ahmed, known to friends as Abdi,

had thrown a punch at him. Earlier that afternoon Abdi had called his older brother, 19-year-old Faisal Ahmed, after he'd been punched by a 15-year-old boy.

Abdi was stabbed to death by Sibanda, then 16, with a combat knife as he and his brother went looking for those responsible for the earlier attack.

Manchester Crown Court heard that Sibanda had an 'established history' of carrying knives.

After being brought before the courts he took part in a knife crime prevention programme called 'Behind the Blade, which focused on the 'hazards' of carrying knives and the 'consequent risk of serious harm and death? In the year before the killing, Sibanda had posted a rap online 'in which he appeared to glorify the use of extreme knife violence, prosecutor Alaric Bassano said.