Overview

• Renai Belle, 30, was jailed for life at the Old Bailey with a minimum term of 28 years after being found guilty of murdering his former friend Josh McKay.
• Tenika Parker was handed a two-year, three-month sentence for perverting the course of justice and knife possession, and Daniel Cooper received a 30-week term for supplying the weapon.
• Prosecutors described how Belle lured McKay to Hollywood Cuts wearing a balaclava and stabbed him in the neck in front of his young son after McKay refused to bankroll Belle’s music video.
• McKay’s mother delivered an emotional impact statement condemning Belle’s betrayal and urging the public to recognize knife killings as murder rather than impersonal “knife crime.”
• Josh McKay’s family and the young care leavers he supported continue to mourn his loss and call for greater awareness of premeditated violence and stronger support for victims’ families.