'Adolescence was really good but didn't show the devastation caused to victims'
Nearly two years on from losing her son Mikey Roynon, his mother is still in shock. Hayley Ryall's beloved boy was just 16 when he went to a birthday party at a house in Bath and didn't come home.
For on June 10 2023, the much-loved teenager was stabbed with a zombie-style knife and died from a single 9.5cm (3.7in) wound to his neck. Upwards of 70 kids had travelled from Bristol, Bath and further afield to the party and Shane Cunningham, 16, was later detained for life for Mikey's murder with his two friends, Leo Knight and Cartel Bushnell, also 16, jailed for manslaughter.
Mikey didn't know the trio, who were pictured travelling from Wiltshire to Bath with what appeared to be sharp objects visible underneath their clothing. "I miss everything about him," said Hayley. "I miss doing his washing, i even miss telling him off for being late.
"I miss the mess, I miss cooking for him, I miss that terribly. everything. I just miss the noise in the house. I miss Christmas because we don't have that anymore, I miss birthdays, I miss everything."
Hayley was working in Birmingham at the time of her son's death, with 37 missed calls on her phone before Mikey's friend alerted to what had happened, leaving her facing a three hour taxi ride back to Bristol as she prayed he would be ok. "Every day i wake up in the morning and i still feel in shock," she said.
"People say time heals but it doesn't get easier. I have a big wall up where I feel like if I talk about him and go in his bedroom, I can feel him around me and he's still here."
Hayley describes her son as "completely fearless" and "a lot of fun". "He liked playing lots of jokes on me," she said. "He was always excited, he was happy. He told me he loved me about 30 times a day. That was the last thing he said to me: 'Love you Mum'."
A district manager for Slimming World, the bereaved mother is appearing in tonight's C5 documentary The Real Adolescence: Our Killer Kids, which explores the rise in murder convictions for 12-17 year olds in the UK, focusing on the experiences of families affected by these crimes. The hit Netflix four-part series that inspired the show's name, Adolescence, attracted more than 24 million viewers.
Starring Stephen Graham, the drama follows 13-year-old Jamie, who is accused of murdering his female classmate. "I thought it was very very good, i just felt like there could have been more towards the victim's family," said Hayley. "It was all about the boy that did it and his family but it didn't show the devastation that causes to the community around that."
The statistics are harrowing. The number of children convicted of murder between 2016 and 2024 rose by more than 300 per cent. Information published by the Office for National Statistics earlier this year found teenager homicide victims in England and Wales were far more likely to have been stabbed to death than any other group - 83 per cent were killed with a sharp instrument.
Zombie-style knives and machetes, including the one that was used to kill Mikey are defined as weapons with blades over eight inches in length, normally with a serrated cutting edge. Last year, they were banned in England and Wales.
Mum Hayley had thought knife crime was "something that happened in London, in big major cities, not where we live," before it affected her family. "Not that you could go to a 16th birthday and have this happen," she said. "The reason I'm speaking in the documentary is because I wish I'd known more two years ago - if it saves one person's life it's worth it.
"If it gets the message out to stop one young person carrying a knife, it's worth it. We need to stop the epidemic of knife crime."
"We have to change how the next generation - it can't keep getting worse," Hayley added. "It is important because kids are killing kids."
The TV show Adolescence explores how technology, particularly social media, influences the lives of young people with toxic masculinity and online abuse at the forefront. It also takes a wider look at the pressures faced by boys in Britain today.
"These kids have to deal with at such a young age with technology - it's not the real world," said Hayley. "We need to be checking in and asking 'are you ok?'."
In May last year Mikey's murderer Cunningham was ordered to serve a life sentence, with a minimum of 16 years behind bars, at Bristol Crown Court. His friend Bushnell was detained for nine years and Knight for nine years and six months.
"The court case was horrific to go through, to have to sit with those boys in a room," said Hayley. "We were not even allowed to look at them. Getting justice for Mikey, it made a tiny difference but it won't change the fact that it ruined our lives."
Hayley and her partner Scott, a 48-year-old insurance manager, have formed the charity Mikey's World, which has teamed up with her local police force and ambulance service to install specialist first-aid kits, which contain emergency dressings and tourniquets to stop catastrophic bleeding, around her son's hometown. The organisation is also partnering with a technology company to offer virtual reality headset experiences which allow people to step into the shoes of victims of knife crime and beyond.
"We want to take that into schools to prevent knife crime and raise the awareness of gangs," said Hayley. "I've not watched the knife crime one yet because it's just too difficult."
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Scottish Sun
10 hours ago
- Scottish Sun
How real Oceans 11 gang bagged £100m in world's biggest heist with spy cams & fake vault… but were undone by rooky error
IT was known as the Belgian 'Fort Knox' and security was second to none - with its seemingly impenetrable vault, state of the art alarms and high spec motion sensors. Yet the World Diamond Center, in Antwerp, was the scene of the biggest and most audacious diamond heist in history, in 2003, which saw thieves getting away with an estimated $100m and left police scratching their heads as to how they managed it. 12 The vault was ransacked by a criminal gang that got away with £100million Credit: Netflix 12 They were able to get into the diamond vault with 10 layers of security Credit: Netflix 12 Leonardo Notarbartolo admitted being part of the Antwerp gang Credit: Netflix In what could have been the script for a Hollywood movie, the investigation eventually led police to Italy and a gang of elite criminals, known as The School of Turin, each specialising in various skills including safe breaking and security cameras. As brilliant as the heist was, involving a camera pen and even a replica vault, the sophisticated gang were finally undone through one schoolboy error - a bag of rubbish containing half eaten cheese and a salami baguette which had been dumped in a forest outside the city. In the Netflix documentary, Stolen: Heist of the Century, one of the jewel thieves explains how it was done and the detectives leading the case tell how they eventually managed to track down their culprits.. On Monday, 17 February, 2003, Agim De Bruycker, then Commander of the police Diamond Squad in Antwerp, was greeted at his office by his colleague, Detective Patrick Peys. READ MORE IN FEATURES GOALDEN GIRLS Lionesses' Beatlemania proves women's football is getting respect it deserves 'There has been a burglary,' he said. 'A safe has been broken open.' It was to prove something of an understatement. When they arrived at the Diamond Center, they were greeted by a scene of chaos, with panicking dealers wondering if their diamonds, gold or money was gone. Two floors below, carnage awaited. 'I saw a steel door a foot thick, standing open,' Patrick recalls. 'Inside, the walls were covered with individual lockers. The majority were cracked and opened. I was standing in front of Ali Baba's cave.' The floor was scattered with bank notes and small emeralds that the thieves deemed not worth their time. Nearly all of the 189 safe deposit boxes had been raided. The heist immediately hit the news headlines and the pressure was on the police to find out who had done it. But the mystery was also how had they done it? 'The combination on the safe door was changed weekly and that dial would give you 100million possibilities,' says Patrick. In addition was a clever magnetic alarm system consisting of two metal plates – one attached to the vault door, the other to the door jamb. If someone tried to open the door while the alarm was still activated, it would break the magnetic field and the alarm would set off. The Sun's reporter blags London landmarks Inside the vault was a light detector and a motion and heat detector. The light sensor had been covered with black duct tape and the motion sensor sprayed with hairspray. The 13-storey building had 24 cameras working day in, day out. The footage for each day was stored on a videocassette but the ones for February 15 and 16 – the weekend of the heist – were missing. 'I was thinking this had to be an inside job,' says Agim. 'You had the security, two concierges and the building manager. We started investigating them thoroughly and searched their houses but in the end, we had to clear them all. We had no idea who had committed the crime. Then, suddenly, in the afternoon, I got a telephone call.' Breakthrough 12 Antwerp in Belgium has been a major diamond centre since medieval times Credit: Getty 12 Agim De Bruycker and Patrick Peys in Stolen: Heist of the Century (L to R) Credit: Netflix A shopkeeper had found a bag of rubbish dumped in The Floordambos Woods, 25 miles south of Antwerp, where he liked to go to feed the rabbits and fish. Inside was a lot of torn paper with words like Antwerp and Diamonds. Realising it wasn't the usual type of fly-tipped rubbish he called the police. 'That call changed everything,' says Patrick. 'The bags also contained some very small green emerald stones, banknotes, wrenches and flashlights as well as some left over food – pasta, cheese, a half-eaten salami sandwich, wine. This was strange because I don't think they had a picnic in the vault room. The food was probably from a hideout.' Another critical piece of evidence found in the woods was the casing of the video cassettes kept at the Diamond Center. But the tape had been removed. A search of the highway between Antwerp and Brussels found that the tape had been dumped en-route. Experts from Sony were able to reinstall it into the casing so that it could be watched. It was a big moment that promised to show the thieves at work. 'We had all the investigators together, along with my superiors, for the screening,' recalls Agim. 'The tape is put into the cassette player, the film starts… and it was a porn movie.' I've never been so disappointed in a porn movie as I was then! Patrick Peys 'I've never been so disappointed in a porn movie as I was then!' adds Patrick. The police started piecing together the torn paper found in the rubbish bag. Some of it formed a document, written in Italian, which was a permit to install a security system at an office in the Diamond Center. The document was issued by the Italian diamond company Damoros Preziosi. The company had an office in the building that had been rented for two years but cupboards and desks were empty. 'The building manager didn't know the man who rented that office very well but she could tell us that he was an Italian businessman named Leonardo Notarbartolo. She had no address for him,' says Agim. When police went through CCTV footage in the building, she was eventually able to point him out. Like many other dealers who rented space in the building, he regularly went down to the vault to store his jewels. He never spoke to anyone and never attracted attention. But a check with Italian police found he was a well-known criminal with convictions for burglary and jewellery theft. They believed he was living somewhere in Turin. Paper scraps from the rubbish bag also revealed an envelope with the name Elio D'Onorio with an address close to Rome. He turned out to be an alarm specialist and a known Italian criminal. The rubbish also revealed a receipt from a hardware shop located between Antwerp and Brussels in which various items used in the robbery were used, such as an extendable mop that was found in the vault. The shop owner was able to provide the police with a description of the man who bought them and an identikit picture matched that of D'Onorio. A colleague of Agim and Patrick's showed them a file he had on an attempted burglary that had taken place at the Diamond Center six years earlier by a man pretending to be a diamond dealer who was also from Turin called Ferdinando Finotto. 'The School of Turin' Marci Martino, head of the Flying Squad in Turin, informed the Antwerp detectives about a group specialising in thefts of banks and bank vaults there that journalists have coined, 'The School of Turin.' 'He explained that it was a bunch of people, each specialising in some form of criminal behaviour,' says Patrick. 'So, they picked who they needed according to his or her speciality.' 'It made a lot of sense to us,' says Agim. 'Certainly given the way the thieves had tackled all these security systems.' With three names now in the bag, Agim and Patrick began working out how they thought the operation had been done. But their version and that of Notarbartolo's differ. The Antwerp detectives believe that entrance was gained from the garage that led through a connecting door directly into the building on the ground floor. A modified Allen key, found in the rubbish at Floordambos, opened the door when they tested it. Career criminal 12 Notarbartolo received a 10-year prison service Credit: BELGA PHOTO 12 Outside the Antwerp World Diamond Centre (AWDC) in the diamond district of Antwerp, Belgium Credit: getty 12 In a new Netflix documentary, Notarbartolo explains how it was done Credit: Netflix And in an exclusive interview, Leonardo Notarbartolo tells the documentary makers his side of the story. Born in Palermo, he got into crime at the age of six when he stole 5,000 lire from a cowherd. 'In the 80s, I opened my first jewellery shop,' he says. 'I started going back and forth to Antwerp to buy gemstones and got an apartment there and an office and safe deposit box at the Diamond Center.' He admits to being part of the gang who carried out the heist but named a mysterious figure who he claimed was the mastermind of the crime. If I took photos inside the vault, he would give me 100,000 dollars. I said, 'Okay. I'm in' Leonardo Notarbartolo 'I am a participant. The mastermind was someone who went by the name of Alessandro, although that probably wasn't his real name. He took me for coffee one day, saying that he knew who I was and that we had met in Italy, and gave me a pen with a tiny little camera inside and said that if I took photos inside the vault, he would give me 100,000 dollars. I said, 'Okay. I'm in.'' In February 2001, two years before the heist, Notarbartolo entered the vault and took pictures of the safe deposits and the alarms systems. He was then asked to join the gang for a share of the spoils worth at least $15m dollars each. 'I had always wanted to be part of something like this. It was too tempting,' he says. 'Alessandro took me to an industrial area where there are warehouses. We go inside and there are three people there who he introduces me to. There were the four of us main ones - The Monster, The Genius, the Key Master and me. The fifth was My Friend. Agim De Bruycker 'The first guy was a master when it came to locks and alarms. He is 1.93 metres tall, well-built. That's why I call him The Monster. The other, The Genius, was a little man, really intelligent. He was half hacker and half computer geek and an expert in alarms. Then there's the one that seems a bit of a thug. He can open any lock. I called him The Key Master. 'They pull aside some big plastic sheets and I see this place which looks just like the vault. It's exactly the same, with the sensors correctly positioned. 'The gang was coming in and out of the Diamond Center to make copies of keys and to check security systems at least 30 times and never left a trace. 'When The Genius realised there was a light bulb above the vault door, he had a micro camera inserted in it to record images of the combination lock below. In the boiler room were some fire extinguishers and The Genius took one and modified it by cutting the bottom and inserting a receiver inside which transmitted images from the camera to us.' The heist Three days before the heist, Notarbartolo, who had graduated from a spy pen to a video camera inside a small bag, used hairspray to fog up the sensor. 'We didn't enter the way the police think we did. We entered from Pelikaanstraat, where there is a space behind the Diamond Center to park cars. We skirted along the walls of the Diamond Center and went up a stepladder that we took with us, to the first floor. The Genius had bypassed the alarm that was on this balcony. 'On the day of the hit, they wanted me to stay outside to keep a watch for any police. There were the four of us main ones - The Monster, The Genius, the Key Master and me. The fifth was My Friend. He has excellent qualities in our line of work. 12 Antwerp is the diamond capital of the world Credit: Getty 'Inside the building they deactivated the two side cameras and then checked the images from the micro-camera to see the last combination that was entered that night. The biggest problem was the magnet alarm. But The Genius had already studied it.' This part of the story tallies with that of the police. 'Some work had been done on the magnetic alarm,' Agim confirms. 'The screws had been removed and shortened so that from the outside everything looks fine but on the inside the screws are not attaching to the door anymore. "Instead, double-sided tape was used. On the night of the heist, they pulled the plates away from the vault door together. The magnetic field is still intact, the alarm is still on but they are able to open the vault door.' Each safe deposit box has an individual key and a three-digit dial but this was by-passed by a cleverly manufactured drill that looked a bit like a corkscrew with two metal bars with which the thieves could force each box open. After a few hours inside, the gang made their get-away in the car driven by Notarbartolo, back to his apartment where they celebrated with some food and wine. 12 A forensic officer examines the crime scene Credit: Netflix How the heist was carried out Two years before Notarbartolo posed as a diamond merchant and rented an office in the Diamond Center, as well as a safety deposit box in the vault. He used his position to pay regular visits to the vault, taking pictures of the alarm systems and sensors and memorising the building's layout. Months before A secret camera was placed in the lighbulb above the vault door, to monitor the combinations used on the lock, which were changed every week. A receiver was placed in a fire extinguisher in a nearby boiler room to transmit images from the camera. Notarbartolo claims the gang regularly met at a warehouse where a full size replica vault had been built, to hone their plan. Days before Notarbartolo used hairspray on the thermal-motion sensors to disable them. The screws on the magnetic plates that locked the vault were loosened. Day of the robbery The gang gained access from a space behind the centre, using a stepladder to climb to a balcony on the first floor. Inside, they used a long, two-part, three-dimensional key along with the vault's combination to open the main door. One plate of the magnetic lock was unscrewed to bypass the alarm system when the vault door was opened. A polystyrene shield was used to block the infrared ray of the motion sensor. The ceiling light sensor was covered with duct tape so the gang could turn the lights on inside the vault. A custom-made, hand-cranked drill was used to open 109 of the 189 safe deposit boxes within the vault. The gang then emptied the contents of the boxes into duffel bags and left the building through a street exit. Before leaving, they stole the security footage from the Diamond Center's office. According to Notarbartolo, it was his job to dispose of things snatched that they did not need. But he says that while he was in the shower someone also threw the remains of their meal into the bags without him realising. When he and his friend took them to the wood, they were startled by a noise and instead of burning it, as intended, dumped it there and fled. The following day the gang met up in Brescia, Italy to divvy up the bounty and, such was Notarbartolo's confidence that he was not on the police's radar, he then went back to Antwerp to return the hired car. The cops were startled when the building manager of the Diamond Center rang them to say that Leonardo Notarbartolo was actually standing in the building right now. Our main suspect returned to Antwerp and was standing in the building that he had robbed a week before. It was unbelievable Agim De Bruycker 'Our main suspect returned to Antwerp and was standing in the building that he had robbed a week before. It was unbelievable,' says Agim. The police rushed there and he was arrested. He reluctantly gave them the address of his apartment and when they drove there, three people were coming out – Notarbartolo's wife and two men, one carrying a rolled up carpet on his shoulder. They were stopped and inside the carpet were small green emeralds. A 'pure fantasy' 12 Special keys to open high-security vaults at the Antwerp Diamond Center are displayed on a table as pieces of evidence at the Antwerp judicial police headquarters Credit: AP Photo/Yves Logghe A search of the apartment found a bag with a hole in the side, perfect for concealing a video camera. 'We also found a receipt from a local supermarket in Antwerp with different food items like wine, pasta, cheese and salami of the type found back in Floordambos,' says Agim. 'We matched Mr Notarbartolo's DNA with that found on the half-eaten salami sandwich. 'Based on the telephone records from SIM cards and on the DNA profiles, we were able to identify four people that were 100 per cent involved in this crime – Ferdinando Finotto (The Monster), Elio D'Onorio (The Genius) and a third person, Pietro Tavano (My Friend) - an old friend of Mr Notarbartolo and also a member of The School of Turin. The fourth person was Notarbartolo.' Agim believes much of Notarbartolo's account is pure fantasy. 'Spy pens? Replica vaults? That isn't the story of a crime, it's more like the script of a movie. There was no super criminal lurking in the background. It was just him.' Notarbartolo received a 10-year prison service and served six years, before being released in 2009. His wife was never charged. Three other gang members were jailed for five years. But the true value of the heist is still a mystery. 'No diamonds or money were recovered,' says Agim. 'We came up with the figure of $100m but I'm sure that the amount is much higher than that.' Stolen: Heist of the Century is on Netflix from August 8
Scottish Sun
11 hours ago
- Scottish Sun
I'm still traumatised & needed antidepressants – Tinder Swindler's victims reveal how life is now 10 years on
TO DATE I'm still traumatised & needed antidepressants – Tinder Swindler's victims reveal how life is now 10 years on Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) A DECADE has passed since Cecilie Fjellhoy and Pernilla Sjoholm's lives were turned around by a man they knew as Simon Leviev. Posing as a billionaire diamond heir, he conned them and countless others out of millions. 8 Simon Leviev used Tinder to seduce and con women out of an estimated £7.4 million Credit: Instagram 8 Pernilla Sjoholm and Cecilie Fjellhoy – victims of tinder swindler Simon Leviev Credit: Pernilla Sjoholm Instagram 8 Tinder Swindler boasts luxury lifestyle with flash vehicles Credit: While the Netflix documentary The Tinder Swindler brought their story to the world, the women he affected say the aftermath and the long road to recovery were far more difficult than anyone could have imagined. "I'm still traumatised," Cecilie, 36, tells The Times. She reveals that 'no victim' should be placed into a courtroom and be forced to defend themselves. Between 2017 and 2019, he posed as Simon, a 31-year-old and the fictional son of billionaire Lev Leviev, to swindle women all over Europe. READ MORE ON TINDLER SWINDLE 'SAY MY NAME' Tinder Swindler breaks silence to attack victims & vows to expose 'truth' After changing his name from Shimon Hayut, Simon Leviev used Tinder to seduce and con women out of an estimated £7.4 million. He falsely claimed to be the son of "King of Diamonds," Lev Leviev, and spun stories about his enemies freezing his bank accounts or attacking his bodyguard, Piotr, to persuade the women to give him their savings or take out loans. Leviev was a wanted man in several European countries, having fled Israel in 2011 to avoid fraud charges. In 2019, he was arrested in Greece for using a fake passport and extradited to Israel. He faced charges for fraud, theft, and forgery, but none of these charges were related to his Tinder scheme or his other alleged crimes abroad. After fleeing Israel to avoid fraud charges from his early 20s, Leviev moved to Finland where he began the Tinder scheme. High-flying businesswoman targeted by The Tinder Swindler after he resurfaced on Instagram He had previously served two years in a Finnish prison for defrauding three women and was released in 2017. He briefly returned to Israel but escaped before he could be captured again. When he was finally arrested in 2019, it was for the forgery, theft, and fraud charges he had previously faced. He was sentenced to 15 months in prison but was released after just five months due to good behavior. Cecilie was conned into taking out nine loans totaling $250,000 (£190,000), and was hounded by creditors to the point where she contemplated suicide. Suicide She eventually sought help at a psychiatric unit and has spent the last seven years in therapy. She 'never wanted to be on' antidepressants but explains that she 'needed them.' Due to being hit with a lawsuit by creditors and police barging into her home, Cecilie needed to be on antidepressants. Pernilla, 38, also contemplated suicide after learning the truth about the man she considered a friend. He's really angry with all the successes that we have had Cecilie Fjellhoy She lost the $45,000 (£33,840) she had saved for a home deposit and then doubled that amount in legal fees when she tried to take her bank to court. The fallout from the exposé in a Norwegian newspaper led to death threats from Leviev, leaving her questioning not only "what I would do to myself; I didn't know what Simon might try to do to me." But today, the women are finally reclaiming their power. The enormous reach of the Netflix documentary made Leviev a recognisable figure, effectively ending his con. 8 He falsely claimed to be the son of "King of Diamonds," Lev Leviev Credit: 8 Pernilla Sjőholm, a Tinder Swindler victim Credit: Jam Press/Pernilla Sj�holm "He's really angry with all the successes that we have had," Cecilie says. "I think he really wanted us to be miserable for the rest of our lives." Instead, they've become fierce advocates for victims of romance fraud. They now travel the world giving talks about online safety, and Pernilla has even co-founded an identity verification platform. The goal Their new book, Swindled Never After: How We Survived (and You Can Spot) a Relationship Scammer, is an unflinching look at their journey, complete with online safety tips and expert insights. The goal, they say, is to change the laws and fight the victim-shaming that so often follows these crimes. Pernilla is now a mother to two-year-old twins and has moved on, refusing to let Leviev "continue to defraud me" by consuming her life with anger. Cecilie, who says she still "loves love," has also returned to dating, albeit with a new sense of caution. 8 Leviev had previously served two years in a Finnish prison for defrauding three women and was released in 2017 Credit: 8 Tinder has stated that they have banned Leviev from their app and that he is not on it under any known alias Credit: 8 Leviev has even reinvented himself as a real estate mogul and offers classes in business education Credit: Instagram She's not worried about being financially duped again, as, "There's nothing left. I'm bankrupt. I can't even get a credit card." While his victims continue to pay off the massive debts he left them with, Leviev is living as a free man in Israel, seemingly without any financial issues. He is rumoured to be dating an Israeli model, Kate Konlin, and his private Instagram account, with over 284,000 followers, is filled with photos of a lavish lifestyle, including helicopters and expensive dinners. Leviev has even reinvented himself as a real estate mogul and offers classes in business education. Tinder has stated that they have banned Leviev from their app and that he is not on it under any known alias.
Daily Mail
16 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Fresh blow for Outback Wrangler Matt Wright on the eve of his criminal trial... He faces the fight of his life - now his best mate's widow has dropped a bombshell
Under-siege TV celebrity Matt Wright has turned his back on his late Netflix co-host after the dead man's wife sued him for millions. In bombshell documents obtained by the Daily Mail, Wright claimed he had no duty of care to mate and Wild Croc Territory co-star Chris 'Willow' Wilson, who died after the helicopter he was dangled 30m from crashed on February 28, 2022.
