Harvey Willgoose trial: Everything Sheffield school murder accused has said during three days of evidence

The defendant has spent three days answering questions from the witness box, after the defence case began on Wednesday (July 16, 2025).

The trial is not sitting today, and the defendant is expected to face a fourth day of questions when it resumes tomorrow morning (Tuesday, July 22, 2025).

Once the defendant’s barrister, Gul Nawaz Hussain KC, has concluded his questions for the defendant, prosecutors will then be given the opporunity to cross-examine him.

The Star is hoping to provide live updates from the press bench through our blog, which you can find below:

The defendant - who cannot be named for legal reasons - has taken responsibility for the stabbing through his guilty plea to the charge of manslaughter. He denies murdering Harvey, however.

He has been on trial at Sheffield Crown Court since Tuesday, July 1, 2025, accused of Harvey’s murder.

15-year-old Harvey was stabbed in the heart in the courtyard of All Saints School a few minutes into the lunch break on February 3, 2025. He collapsed less than a minute later, and died a short time after that.

As we await the fourth day of the defendant’s evidence, below is a summary of everything he has told the jury so far:

Friday, July 18, 2025

• The defendant said he brought a ‘scary’ knife to school on the day of the killing because the messages he received caused him to fear he would be ‘jumped’ or ‘stabbed’.
• He said he believed if he pulled out his ‘scary’ knife, his would-be attackers ‘wouldn’t pull theirs’.
• The defendant told jurors that a weekend of exchanging Snapchat messages with Harvey and others had caused him to fear he may be ‘jumped’ or ‘stabbed’ during the school day . The jury have already heard how this followed a lockdown incident at the school, involving Boy A and Boy B, and following which Harvey is said to have taken the side of Boy A, while the defendant took the side of Boy B.
• During the course of the messages sent over that weekend - some of which have not been retrieved by police - the defendant claimed Harvey told him that if he had a problem with Boy A then he therefore had a problem with him, and he should come to Harvey’s address where he would ‘deal with it, simple’.
• He also said Harvey had sent him a voice note in which he said two other males with violent reputations needed to ‘hear about’ the dispute, and told him: ‘You know my boys are on it’.
• Then, on the morning of the fatal incident, he said he and Harvey talked about having ‘beef’ with each other in Snapchat messages sent in the hours before the school day began.
• The defendant said he had not wanted to go to school out of fear he would be ‘badly’ hurt, but after his dad told him he had to go, he looked up a prayer online in a bid to keep himself safe.
• He encountered Harvey early on in the day, but despite their previous exchanges, the defendant said he initially believed they had managed to get on to ‘alright’ terms with each other after joking around about boxing.
• The pair ended that interaction by ‘shaking hands,’ the jury were told.
• The defendant said things between the pair changed again, however, after they ‘accidentally bumped into each other’ during break time.
• He told jurors that Harvey responded by turning around and saying ‘Watch where you’re f***ing going’ in a manner he described as 'angry'.
• The defendant says he subsequently tapped Harvey on the arm, and had planned to say 'just leave it'.
• He says that before he got the chance to say that, Harvey said: "Don’t touch me, I’ll actually juck you up."

• When asked what ‘juck’ means, the defendant clarified: "In Sheffield, juck means stab you up."
• The defendant said he encountered Harvey again, a little later on in the day.
• Harvey, he said, was positioned next to some other pupils, and whispered something to them, causing all three to 'laugh’ at him.
• The defendant says Harvey then bumped into him intentionally, knocking him with his shoulder.
• "I said ‘what are you bumping into me for?’," recalled the defendant. The defendant said Harvey responded by saying: “I’ll smash you all over” - which he took to mean 'beat him up'. Harvey was walking towards him, as he was walking backwards.He claims Harvey went on to say: "I'll batter you...let's take it outside."
• Mr Hussain asked him how Harvey said it, to which the defendant replied: "Angrily."
• The defendant said he told Harvey: "Hit me then."
• He added that he did not actually want Harvey to hit him.
• “Why did you say ‘hit me’ then?" asked Mr Hussain. The defendant replied: "Because if he hits me first, I’ve got a reason to hit him back."

Thursday, July 17, 2025

• During his second day on the stand, the defendant told jurors about an encounter that led to him feeling as though Harvey had ‘turned against’ him.
• The defendant said it followed an altercation with another pupil (Boy A), during which he was repeatedly called an insulting name.
• When asked how the use of the name had made him feel, the defendant replied: “Annoyed and upset.”
• The defendant claimed Boy A tapped him on the shoulder and repeated the name, before continuing to say it as he covered his face with his hand in a bid to prevent a nearby teacher from hearing what he’d said.
• The defendant said his anger continued to get ‘higher’ during the incident, and that he went on to ‘grab Boy A and pull him off a chair’ before punching a wall.
• Later that day, the defendant claimed Harvey and Boy A’s cousin began talking about him - not to him - in what he described as 'whispered threats'.
• He said he could only hear what Harvey was saying, who was stood up nearby.
• The defendant told jurors that he heard Harvey say: "Who’s coming after school for [the defendant]'?
• "What did you think it means?" asked Mr Hussain. The defendant replied: "Obviously someone to come outside school to hurt me."
• He said that he took the threat seriously, when asked, adding that he didn't think Harvey was joking.
• Asked Mr Hussain: "After you heard Harvey say that, how did you feel?" "Like he turned against me," replied the defendant.
• Mr Hussain continued: "Did you feel good about that?" "No," the boy said.

• "Before he said these things, did you still want to be friends with Harvey," asked Mr Hussain, to which the defendant replied: "Kind of."
• Mr Hussain added: "You’ve told members of the jury about what you’ve been scared of happening, how did what Harvey said make you feel?" The defendant replied: "Even more scared."
• Earlier that day, the defendant said he began getting to know Harvey in September of last year, leading to the two boys being on ‘friendly’ terms.
• The pair subsequently began ‘walking around’ with each other during break and lunch times, and the defendant would even escort Harvey to his tram stop after school even though it was not on his way home.
• “Why would you walk to the tram stop with Harvey if it wasn’t on your way home,” asked Mr Hussain. “Because Harvey asked me to,” replied the defendant, before telling the jury that they would ‘talk about things together’ as they made their way there.
• During the second day of the defendant’s evidence, the jury was shown pictures recovered from the defendant’s phone in which he is seen posing with knives, an axe and a hammer.
• The pictures seen by the jury were taken in December 2024 and January 2025, and the majority of them featured knives.
• Explaining why he took the pictures, or had someone else take them, the defendant said: “Because I’ve seen other people take photos with knives and nothing is said to them. So I thought if I took pictures with knives nothing would be said to me.”
• Gul Nawaz Hussain KC, lead defence counsel, asked the defendant: “What do you mean?” “Once people see pictures they would be scared of the person,” replied the defendant.
• When asked who he wants to be scared of him, the defendant replied by saying ‘people who cause problems for me’.
• Mr Hussain asked the defendant what he thought people ‘wouldn’t do if they were scared’. The defendant responded by saying he thought they wouldn’t ‘threaten’ him or ‘cause problems’. He went on to say that he got ‘the idea’ to pose with knives from ‘someone’s TikTok’.
• Jurors have heard how the defendant wanted to arm himself with a weapon for his ‘protection,’ which he could ‘take out’ in response to others producing a weapon.
• “Knew they carried knives so I thought a knife would help…Knew they carried knives and would use them…if they tried to use a knife I knew I could pull one out,” the defendant said.
• This followed threats he would be ‘smoked’ and ‘shanked’ - which he took to mean stabbed or punched - from associates of a boy he fought with in the past, the defendant told jurors.
• He said the same boy had hurt him ‘quite badly’ after he ‘came from behind and hit me in the head’.

• The defendant had reason to believe that those acting on the boy’s behalf - who were a year or two older - would carry them out. He said this is because the boy had followed through with threats to ‘jump’ him ‘multiple times’.
• “What did you think they would do if they saw you had a knife,” asked Mr Hussain. The defendant replied: “Run away.”
• Mr Hussain continued: “If they did pull a knife, you pull a knife out, they run away, is that something you wanted
• “I’d rather they run away than use it,” the defendant said.
• The defendant told jurors he bought an axe from a fellow pupil at All Saints. He claims he had arranged to buy a ‘small knife’ from the pupil, because he felt he needed one for his ‘own protection’. But when the pupil brought an axe into school instead of a knife, he wound up buying that.
• “I already brought the money in, he brought the axe in, I didn’t think he was going to bring the axe I thought he was going to bring something. “ didn’t want to buy it, I said to him, but he was saying: ‘Oh just buy it, just buy it,’” the defendant told the jury.
• The defendant said he never took the axe out, and never intended to use it.

Wednesday, July 16, 2025

• During the first day of the boy’s evidence, he described the bullying he experienced, both as a primary school pupil, and when he moved on to secondary school. The defendant confirmed the bullying continued when he became a pupil at All Saints.
• The defendant said the bullying he experienced, throughout his time at school, was borne out of things such as his clothes, a medical issue and his appearance.
• Gul Nawaz Hussain KC asked the defendant if the bullying has affected ‘how he can control his temper’.
• “I can get angry quickly, upset quickly, can’t control [it],” said the defendant.
• The defendant also detailed issues with his home life to the jury.
• Mr Hussain asked the defendant if he had ever gone to his parents for help with the bullying.
• He replied by saying he had not approached either his mother or father because he knew they ‘wouldn’t care’.
• “Last week we heard from teachers from All Saints that told us you had said you had a problem with your anger...why do you think you had that problem,” asked Mr Hussain.
• The defendant replied: “Because I can’t control my anger sometimes.”
• Continued Mr Hussain: “Where do you think all this anger comes from?
• “Home,” replied the defendant.

• “Has the bullying affected your anger?” continued Mr Hussain, to which the defendant replied: “Yeah.”
• “Has it made it better or worse?” he asked.
• “Worse,” replied the defendant.
• The defendant said the bullying also made him feel ‘not confident and stuff’.
• He continued by saying the bullying would also continue on social media, which he admitted to using frequently, before and after school, and over weekends.
• “If I had an argument with someone at school, they would get their brother, cousin to message and threaten me,” the defendant said.
• He added: “The worst threat I got was ‘I’ll stab you up’.” The defendants told the jury that such threats made him feel scared.
• The defendant said he was aware he could report bullying to teachers, but that would sometimes result in fellow pupils asking ‘why are you snitching’?’
• “If you are a snitch at school, do people want to hang out with you,” asked Mr Hussain, to which, the defendant replied: “No.”
• The defendant also said he would sometimes become involved in fighting because the consequences of not doing so would result in people thinking he was a 'p***y' which would make bullying worse.
• The defendant told the jury of eight women and four men that he punched a computer screen, during an incident at All Saints in November 2024, because he believed a teacher had treated him ‘unfairly’ by giving him a sanction for something he did not do.
• “Do you accept you got angry?” asked Gul Nawaz Hussain KC, lead defence counsel.
• Replied the defendant: “Yeah.”
• The defendant told the jury that he had been using his phone in class - which he knew was against the rules - but only to check the work he was doing.
• He said he had actually put his phone away in his pocket, but it came to the teacher’s attention after it fell out, and dropped onto the floor.
• “She assumed I was using it for social media…she said: ‘Get off your phone and stop texting people,” said the defendant.

• Mr Hussain asked: “Had you been texting people?” to which the defendant replied ‘no’.
• The defendant continued by saying he tried to explain, but she gave him a C4 - a ‘red card’ sanction which is the equivalent of a detention that must be served immediately - before he had an opportunity to.
• When asked why he punched the monitor, the defendant said: “Got angry…felt it was unfair she gave me a C4.”
• Mr Hussain asked him about Ms Staniforth's live evidence, earlier in the trial, during which she said the defendant claimed to have 'blinded' a pupil at another school during their interaction on that date .
• The defendant explained that when he used the term 'blinded' he meant temporarily, for ‘about three minutes.’
• He told the jury that the incident he was referring to relates to an incident of ‘wrestling,’ at his previous school which took place after the other boy kept telling him to do it and said 'Do it, don't be a p***y'.
• The defendant said he did not want to wrestle, and would not have participated if it was his decision, under further questioning from Mr Hussain.
• He said he 'accidentally' kicked the boy in the eye, after the boy put his leg behind him and tried to 'drop' him.

The defendant has pleaded guilty to charges of manslaughter and possessing a bladed article on school premises.

He denies murder.

The trial, which is now expected to run through to the second week of August, continues

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