LAST UPDATE | 21 Mar 2019
A 16-YEAR-OLD boy has admitted raping and murdering a six-year-old girl during his sentencing hearing, after he initially pleaded not guilty during his trial.
Aaron Campbell was sentenced today to life in prison, and will serve a minimum of 27 years for kidnapping, raping and murdering Alesha McPhail in July 2018, Sky News reported.
Her body was discovered in a wooded area later. Campbell was later charged with her murder, but due to reporting restrictions because of his age, his name wasn’t released until a judge in Glasgow lifted reporting restrictions in February.
Campbell had denied throughout his trial being responsible for Alesha’s disappearance and murder.
During sentencing, Judge Lord Matthews remarked that Campbell had to stop himself laughing at points during the trial, and had never shown remorse.
The judge said that reintegration and rehabilitation are “remote possibilities”.
The court had heard how Alesha was kidnapped from her bed in her grandparents’ home in Rothesay on the Isle of Bute just after 6am on 2 July 2018.
Her body was found just before 9am in a woodland area. A post-mortem revealed she had suffered 117 injuries.
After he was reported to police by his mother, Campbell was arrested and his DNA was later found on Alesha’s body and on items of her clothing.
Campbell had pinned the blame for Alesha’s death on the girl’s parents.
In an earlier statement, Police Scotland’s Detective Superintendent Stuart Houston said that Alesha’s death was “senseless and barbaric” and in what was a “particularly harrowing case”.
To be faced with the death of a little girl in such a cold and cruel way was extremely difficult for everyone.
“The effects of her death are still being felt today,” he said.
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