“There are a series of clips showing Dea John and his friends on a bus journey.
“Dea-John walked on foot around the Kingstanding area. They walk past the library where they encounter the defendants.
“That is where the two groups first encounter each other.
“The 16-year-old was chased across to VNP News. The defendant’s group went off to Newstead Road.
“The two groups came together for the second time at the Kingstanding convenience store.
“Dea-John has run across the road and turned down College Road, followed by one of the 15-year-old defendants and others.
Dea John seeking refuge standing behind a car.
“That is where Dea-John was stabbed.”
They shared a joint desire to exact revenge for the attempted robbery that had taken place earlier in the day.
“When Khan parked his car, you can see all five sprung into action. They did so with no hesitation at all. This was a concerted plan.
“All five had been together in the car. It is inconceivable they would not have been aware that lethal weapons were being carried.
“The CCTV recordings show these five chasing Dea-John. Brandishing weapons.
“Threatening and violent words were used. This is not a case of self defence or of some defendants not knowing what was happening. There were in it all together.
“He stabbed him to the chest.”
Another witness driving along College Road did not see any of Dea-John’s group carrying weapons, the prosecutor said.
“His attention was drawn to a youth. This is the youth he saw stab one of the group,” he added.
“He describes a youth being chased, having a face-off. The youth in the tracksuit was the aggressor. He looked pumped up.
“He produced a knife in his right hand which he held in front of him and then made stabbing motions with the knife towards the other male.
“He then thrust the knife into the other male’s chest. The male who had been stabbed pulled up his t-shirt, shuddered and collapsed.”
some of the defendants ran back to the car but it was locked.
They then ran along Twickenham road.
“The key part to all of this is captured in six minutes,” he said.
There were motorists and pedestrians in the vicinity.
“They all share a common theme, a group chase and an attack on Dea-John.”
A teenager has been jailed for six and a half years for killing Dea-John Reid, 14, who was stabbed to death in broad daylight in a Birmingham street.
Dea-John was chased down and fatally stabbed in the chest, after the killer armed himself with a knife and was driven around the Kingstanding area looking for Dea-John.
He died in College Road, Kingstanding on the evening of 31 May last year.
While the killer was being driven around the area, a racial slur was shouted at Dea-John’s group from the car. As a result of this, the killing was treated as racially aggravated.
Today at Birmingham Crown Court, the teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was sentenced to six and a half years.
He has convicted of manslaughter, but cleared of murder, at a trial in March. Four other people were cleared of murder.
Det Supt Shaun Edwards, head of our Homicide department, said: “Dea-John was a 14-year-old boy – just a child with his whole life ahead of him.
“He had no convictions or cautions; he was an innocent boy.
“To have lost his life in such an appalling way, shattering all the hopes his family had to see him grow up, is absolutely tragic.
“I can’t imagine what it must feel like for the family, not only to lose a son in such tragic circumstances, but then to also sit through that trial, seeing graphic CCTV of your child’s last moments played out in a court room.
“We have worked closely with the Crown Prosecution Service to bring this case before a jury, which returned its verdicts.”
Today, Dea-John’s mother Joan Morris said: “Dea-John Reid my son, my handsome son, is no longer with us.
“He was my son, a brother, an uncle and a nephew, a cousin, and a friend.
“Monday, 31st May 2021 will be a day in my life that I will never forget. After seeing my son bouncing around with life and he went out to play football and never returned despite me speaking to him at approximately 7pm on the evening of 31st of May 2021, telling me that he would be home in 40 minutes, which never came.
“The only call I had was from a friend telling me that my son had been hurt in Kingstanding and that I should make my way there which I duly did, only to see in the middle of College Road a blue tent behind a Police cordon for which I was told my son was lying on the ground underneath the tent dead as he had been stabbed. Being told that I cannot go and see my son or cuddle him.
“Suddenly, my youngest baby at the tender age of 14 had gone and all I was being told is that I cannot even see him. The next time I saw him was in a mortuary in Coventry.
“It dawned upon me that my son Dea-John, a budding footballer someone who wanted to be a Dentist had been torn away out of my life breaking my heart into pieces, by the actions of others, forever.
“Dea-John used to be there for me, he would make me a cup of tea, get my medication. We had a fantastic relationship, which was abruptly destroyed by the actions of others.
“The final act of love I could show to my son was to ensure he had the send-off which he deserved.
“Whilst members of the perpetrator’s family will be able to visit their loved one and eventually see him released back in the community, my only visit to Dea-John, is to a grave in a cemetery.
“My only reunion with Dea-John may well be if I am still in this country, to join him in his grave when the Lord calls me home.”
