Harvey Willgoose: Teacher saw murder accused with knife in 'weapon pose' after fatal school stabbing
A teacher has described the moment she found a teenage boy accused of murder holding a knife in a ‘weapon pose’ in the moments after he stabbed another pupil to death.
Harvey Willgoose was standing in the courtyard at All Saints Catholic High School in Sheffield, when a knife was thrust into his chest, penetrating his heart in an incident on February 3, 2025.
Harvey collapsed around a minute after being stabbed, and died a short time later.
Teacher Carolyn Siddall is among the staff members at the school who saw the immediate aftermath of the incident which cost Harvey his life.
She described finding the boy who carried out the stabbing - who cannot be named for legal reasons - with the knife still in his hand. The defendant, a teenage boy who was also a pupil at All Saints, admits Harvey’s manslaughter, but denies murdering him.
“I literally turned round from where I’d been standing by the doors and he was there…and immediately…saw the knife in his hand…so I was not aware of anything he’d done…with the knife and he seemed to be saying ‘I’m not going to hurt anyone’,” Ms Siddall told detectives, in an interview played to the jury today (Thursday, July 10, 2025).
Ms Siddall said she and Rachel Hobkirk, another teacher who was present, began asking the defendant to drop the knife.
“He seemed to be saying ‘I’m not going to hurt anyone’. So I think Rachel and I thought there was a possibility that it was possible for him to put it down.
“And he did sort of look as though he was listening to us…And that I felt there was a possibility that he might actually put it down…but he was equally rather…you know his body language was a bit sort of jumpy…you know he wasn’t standing there stood still…he was moving with it…a bit sort of dancing, not quite on his toes, but sort of backwards and forwards…with it in his hand.”
“It was raised, it was clear to see…there was a knife, so he hadn’t got it concealed. It was very much out there…for everyone to be able to see at that point.”
Ms Siddall said the defendant was holding the knife at a 45 degree angle.
“And I think whilst we thought he might put it down, it was very much in a weapon pose at that time,” she told detectives.
The jury of eight women and four men heard from assistant headteacher, Morgan Davis, yesterday (Wednesday, July 9, 2025) and today. He described how, after arriving on the scene, he joined Ms Siddall and Ms Hobkirk in asking the defendant to drop the knife.
Mr Davis said that while the defendant allowed him to take the knife, he did not offer it, and kept a ‘grip’ on it as it was being taken from him.
Ms Siddall also told police that after her encounter with the defendant she made her way to the courtyard, where members of staff with first aid training were attempting to come to Harvey’s aid.
“The quantity of blood made me think we needed an ambulance urgently,” she said.
Ms Siddall added that she subsequently made her way to the front of the school to wait for ambulance crews to show them where they needed to go.
The trial, which is expected to last four weeks, continues.