Teenagers guilty of killing Bhim Kohli, 80, in park attack

A 15-year-old boy and 13-year-old girl have been found guilty of killing an 80-year-old man who was filmed being punched and kicked during a fatal attack at a park.

Leicester Crown Court heard the boy racially abused Bhim Kohli, and slapped him in the face with a slider shoe while he was on his knees during the “intense attack”, while the girl encouraged the violence and filmed it on her phone while laughing.

Mr Kohli died the day after the assault, which occurred yards from his home while he was walking his dog Rocky in Franklin Park, Braunstone Town, Leicestershire, on 1 September.

The boy was charged with murder and manslaughter, but was acquitted of the more serious charge on Tuesday.

Neither defendant can be named because of their ages.

The boy was remanded in custody, while the girl was released on conditional bail.

They will be sentenced on 19 and 20 May.

When the verdicts were read out, the boy leaned forward in the dock while the girl cried, and hugged her mother when she was released.

Addressing the girl, Mr Justice Turner said: “I want to make it absolutely crystal clear that the fact that bail is being granted should not be taken as any indication as to the sentence when the time comes.”

The judge, who will consider a media application to lift reporting restrictions on 19 May, thanked the jury – which deliberated for more than six hours – for their “obvious hard work”.

After the hearing, Mr Kohli’s daughter Susan Kohli recalled the moment she found her dad at the park “screaming out” in pain.

“It was horrendous, we have never seen him like that before. We all thought he would go to hospital to be treated and he would then be fine. We never imagined he wouldn’t return home. My dad passed away before our eyes, surrounded by his family,” she said.

“We feel anger and disgust towards the teenagers who took dad away from us. They humiliated an 80-year-old man, assaulted him, filmed it and laughed at him.

“The boy… used violence so severe that he broke three of dad’s ribs and neck which caused trauma to his spinal column.”

Mrs Kohli told of watching the video of her father being hit by the slider shoe.

“A loud horrible slapping sound is heard when the boy struck dad,” she said. “Hearing the girl laugh at this assault on dad is utterly disgusting. This sound plays over and over in our heads. Also captured on video is dad’s attempt to call for help as he shouted out for his grandson.”

Mrs Kohli said her father was a “devoted life partner to my mum for 55 years”, as well as a retired businessman, a close friend to many and a “very active” man who had three allotment plots where he grew fruit and vegetables.

“He was an amazing man who loved life. He never took himself seriously. He was good fun to be around and very chatty,” she said.

“He was the person who knitted our family together and we miss him every second of every day.

“The area we have loved for so many years and called home feels so different now and we will never feel safe.

“Having happened only a minute’s walk of where we live is something we cannot get away from and it is a constant reminder.

“Every time my mum opens the front door she thinks about what happened to her husband.”

Both defendants were among a group of children who encountered Mr Kohli in the park on the day he was fatally injured, the trial, which lasted more than five weeks, heard.

Opening the prosecution case, Harpreet Sandhu KC said: “[Bhim Kohli] left his home on Bramble Way. Having left his home, he walked a few yards to the entrance of Franklin Park, where he was going to take his dog for a walk.

“However, Mr Kohli would not get the opportunity to walk his dog for long and never would he return home. That is because in Franklin Park, Mr Kohli had the misfortune to encounter these two defendants.”

Mr Sandhu told the court the boy and girl had spent the afternoon together at Braunstone Park before going to the boy’s home, where he changed his clothes and wore black sliders – a loose-fitting type of shoe similar in appearance to flip-flops – which the barrister said were used in the attack.

He said CCTV footage showed Mr Kohli walked with his dog to Franklin Park at about 18:18 BST, followed by the two defendants and three other children a few minutes later.

The footage of the assault was shown to the jury.

Jurors heard Mr Kohli was discovered by two of his children “on the ground and in obvious pain”.

Mr Kohli, the court heard, had told his daughter he had been punched in the face, kicked, and racially abused.

His cause of death was given as a neck injury causing spinal cord damage, and he had a number of other injuries including fractured ribs.

The boy told a friend he would go “on the run” to Hinckley, in Leicestershire, the day after the attack but was arrested by police minutes later while hiding in a bush, the court heard.

In a letter written by the boy, after he had been charged, to a professional who was working with him, he said: “I am so nervous, well scared and worried. I accept I did it and I’m doing time, I’m just scared about how long I have to do.”

He also said in the letter that his girlfriend had broken up with him and he had been “struggling with that”, so he “needed anger etc releasing”.

When the professional told the boy that the contents of his letter would need to be disclosed, the boy said “that’s my manslaughter plea gone”, Mr Sandhu told the jury.