| Killing of Katie Rough | |
|---|---|
| Location | York, United Kingdom |
| Date | 9 January 2017 4:20 p.m. – 4:35 p.m. (GMT) |
Attack type | Child-on-child homicide by smothering, stabbing, manslaughter |
| Weapons | Glove, Stanley knife (used post-mortem) |
| Victim | Katie Sharon Rough, aged 7 |
| Perpetrator | 15-year-old female[1] |
| Motive | Unclear, allegedly due to delusions of Rough being non-human |
| Verdict | Pleaded guilty |
| Convictions | Manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility (24 November 2017) |
| Charges | First-degree murder (dropped)
|
| Sentence | Life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 5 years |
Katie Sharon Rough[2] (16 January 2009[3] – 9 January 2017), a 7-year old English girl, died in the Woodthorpe area of her hometown of York in the United Kingdom, on 9 January 2017.[1] She was killed by a girl aged 15 years old at the time, who handed herself in to the police immediately after attacking Rough. Under UK law, Rough's killer was considered a minor at the time of the killing, and so her name was not made publicly known in the subsequent investigation and trial.[1]
Rough's killer pleaded guilty to manslaughter on grounds of diminished responsibility.[1] It emerged that the teenager had been suffering from psychosis at the time of the attack, caused by an unknown psychiatric disorder and she was subsequently sentenced to a minimum of five years' detention on 24 November 2017.[4]