But the convictions have sparked huge controversy, with racial justice campaigners saying the 10 were found “guilty by association”. The case sparked a protest march and a campaign that led to more than 500 people offering guidance, treatment and teaching to those convicted. Ademola Adedeji, 19, and three friends from Moston, north Manchester, were jailed for eight years on Friday for conspiracy to cause grievous bodily harm. They were jailed for taking part in a private group chat on the Telegram messaging app days after one of their friends was killed. Kids of Colour, a youth justice organization that organized the march and offered guidance, said the case showed elements of “thought policing”. He said innocent young people had been criminalized for sending immature messages in the midst of grief, messages that were misinterpreted as evidence of violent intent. Most of the 10 youngsters attended the same school in Moston. They were convicted of plotting violent revenge for the murder of their friend – a 16-year-old aspiring rapper named Alexander John Soyoye, who performed music under the name “MD”. None of those named as targets in the Telegram chat were injured, although three of the accused continued to violently attack two other boys using knives and a car as a weapon. Sentencing them on Friday, the judge, Mr Justice Goose, said the case involved two rival gangs, the M40 from Moston and the RTD gang from Rochdale and Oldham. “It played out on social media and through rap music, with threats of violence, displays of weapons, including firearms, machetes and crossbows. Entering a gang’s territory was treated as a challenge, to be met with violence or the threat of violence,” he said. The defendants denied being in a gang, insisting that M40 was a musical collective in which some of them rapped. The jury was shown YouTube videos of some of the teenagers rapping and posing in Moston with their faces covered. Four of the accused had nothing to do with the M40 music group, beyond watching one or two of their videos. Among them was Adedeji, described by his youth worker as “a truly outstanding young man”. He was head of his school and had created a book that inspired young black people in Mauston. The book, called Something to Say, led to his invitation to parliament in 2019, when he was 16. He had an unconditional offer to study law at Birmingham University, which he took up while on bail. Adedeji’s coach at the Salford Red Devils youth rugby league team said he was “the type of star pupil we’re looking for to go to the big leagues and hopefully make the England team”. At weekends, the teenager was a carer for people with dementia. His best friend, Raymond Savi, also 19, came from “the most loving family you could hope for”, his lawyers said. He had honors in his studies and a place at Salford University to study accountancy. Another friend of theirs, Azim Okunola, 19, was just about to finish his computer science and artificial intelligence degree with first class honors when he was sentenced, having completed the course in two years instead of three. Another friend, Omolade Okoya, 19, was studying public services at college, with hopes of one day working in the police, ambulance or fire service. None of these four will achieve their ambitions anytime soon. The public gallery was packed with their friends and family members who wept as eight-year sentences were handed down, with one boy’s father shouting: “Racists!” Adedeji, Savi, Okunola and Okoya were all convicted based on a series of messages posted on a group chat called “MDs World [crying emoji]” in a few hours on November 8, 2020, three days after Soyoye was killed. None of the four had weapons, nor were they involved in violent actions or “scoping missions” to identify people who would be targeted for violence. However, a jury found them guilty of participating in a three-month-long conspiracy, which included at least two violent attacks carried out by other defendants. The prosecution said their role in the plot was to identify who was to be attacked and obtain information about their whereabouts. The incriminating Telegram chat was created by another accused, Harry Oni, shortly after Soyoye was fatally stabbed by members of the RTD gang. Oni and three other accused – Brooklyn Jitobah, Martin Junior Thomas and Simon Thorne – were there when Soyoye was murdered. They engaged in a street fight with 13 youths from the RTD gang that involved machetes and metal pipes, but fled, leaving Soyoye to bleed to death alone. He had been stabbed 15 times, including in the perineum. The prosecution said it was the “guilt and shame” of knowing they had fled and left Soyoye to die that prompted them to seek violent revenge. The prosecution said the Telegram conversation showed the 10 plotting to exact their revenge, selecting targets. Adedeji contributed 11 of the 345 messages in the conversation. Someone saw him broadcast the zip code of one of Soyoye’s killers. They were never attacked, but were eventually convicted of Soyoye’s murder. Savi also wrote 11 of the 345 messages, participating in the conversation for 14 minutes. In one post, he suggested I “kidnap” the cousin of one of Soyoye’s killers and have his phone taken away so he can’t contact others. Savi’s defense was that he made no serious suggestions and had no idea that any actual violence could take place as a result. In this case, no one was ever kidnapped as part of the conspiracy. Oni, Jitobah and two others – Jeffrey Ojo and Gideon Kalumda – were found guilty of conspiracy to murder. Oni, Ojo and Kalumda were sentenced to 21 years. Jitobah was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Roxy Legane, the director of Kids of Colour, said the case was the latest in a series of trials that have seen large groups of often black boys jailed for those they know. “This is a case of guilt by association because, once again, the wrongs of a small minority have cast a much wider net for prosecution,” he said. “For these 10 boys, knowing each other, whether through school or church, has been manipulated to bring them closer and draw broader conclusions about what it means to know each other. “Their associations become evidence of guilt. Co-ed schools, social media friendships, musical interests, messaging groups and, of course, sharing that they are black have been used to label them as a criminal gang.” He said the private messages used to reinforce a gang narrative were actually “thoughtless, immature, emotional messages” which “became criminal, became intent: it’s like thought policing”. The case was tried under conspiracy law, which was enacted long before the age of mobile phones and social media. It has similarities to crimes prosecuted as “joint enterprise”, a common law doctrine where one person can be jointly convicted of another’s crime if the court decides that they foresaw that the other party was likely to commit that crime. But the judge stressed: “The defendants were not in joint enterprise. were each of the principal parties who played a full part in the commission of the offense of a criminal conspiracy either to kill others or to intentionally cause them grievous bodily harm.’
