Teen detained for life after three injured in hammer attack at Devon boarding school, blames sleepwalking

The teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, assaulted the victims while they slept, wearing only his boxer shorts and armed with weapons he had prepared to defend against a "zombie apocalypse” at Blundell’s School, a boarding school in Tiverton, Devon.

The attack occurred shortly before 1am on June 9, 2022, when the boy, having collected three claw hammers, targeted two pupils who were asleep in cabin-style beds in a boarding house. Housemaster Henry Roffe-Silvester was awoken by the noise and intervened, only to be struck repeatedly over the head by the defendant.

A fellow student who heard the commotion called emergency services, initially believing there was an intruder. The two boys, found in their beds with skull fractures, internal injuries, and punctured lungs, have since been living with long-term consequences from the attack.

The defendant admitted to the assaults but claimed he was sleepwalking at the time. His defence argued that the incident was "a textbook example of sleepwalking violence," citing expert testimony from Dr Mark Pressman, who said the attack bore no signs inconsistent with sleepwalking.

However, the prosecution successfully argued that the defendant had premeditated the violence, with prosecutor James Dawes KC telling the jury, "He had motive, that he had planned something like this, thought about it in advance, and he was awake."

He told jurors: “The investigation has uncovered an obsession that the defendant had with one of the boys, an obsession with hammers as weapons, and an obsession with killing and killers and the killing of children.

“He had a motive, that he had planned something like this, thought about it in advance, and he was awake. He was using his iPad right up to the moment before the attack.

“Mr Roffe-Silvester said he thought the defendant appeared to be ‘on a mission’ and afterwards his face and body relaxed, and he was calm and slumped on his feet, squatting against the wall.”

Relatives of the defendant also told the court about a history of sleepwalking in their family.

Another expert, Dr John O’Reilly, said he did not believe the boy was asleep because a sleepwalker does not initiate violence because it is triggered by noise or touch. Giving evidence, the boy said he kept two hammers by his bed “for protection” from the “zombie apocalypse”.

The boy added: “I feel very terribly sorry for all three individuals because of what I did to them. I feel very sorry for everyone, the families and themselves.”

Speaking after the sentencing, Detective Inspector Dave Egan said: “This was an unprovoked attack on two schoolboys as they slept in their beds. The assaults were both brutal and savage and I have no doubt that his intent was to kill.

“Our detectives worked tirelessly to prove that the offender had indeed been fully conscious when committing this horrendous attack, which had been months in the planning.”