Overview

• The youth pleaded guilty on July 16 in Stratford Youth Court to criminal damage and causing a public nuisance after hurling a 15 kg sofa roughly 50 ft from a third-floor balcony.
• Prosecutors dropped the more serious count of recklessly endangering life, focusing instead on about £500 in damage and the narrowly averted risk to shoppers below.
• District Judge Talwinder Buttar granted conditional bail with a curfew and ordered youth justice reports to inform the August 13 sentencing, warning custody remained a possibility.
• Viral TikTok footage and Westfield Stratford’s CCTV enabled police to identify the boy and his co-defendant, whose self-shot video circulated widely after the March 1 stunt.
• The second 15-year-old, accused of filming the incident, denies the charges and is due at Stratford Youth Court for a case management hearing in September ahead of trial.