Pupil who stabbed teacher in head given four-year detention order

A pupil who stabbed a teacher in the head with a kitchen knife after asking her to check his homework has been sentenced to four-and-a-half years in youth detention.

The 16-year-old boy followed Vicki Williams into her empty classroom at Milford Haven Comprehensive School, Pembrokeshire, after asking for help with his work on 5 February.

The teenager pulled a knife from his bag and lunged at her, Swansea Crown Court previously heard, with Williams saying she feared she would die.

After the trial in July, he was found not guilty of attempted murder but guilty of wounding with intent.

On Thursday, Judge Thomas told the court there was a "significant degree of planning" and that "time stood still" for Williams.

During the trial, Williams said the attack "came out of nowhere" after the boy - who cannot be named due to a court order - asked her for help with his work at the end of the school day.

He closed the classroom door behind him and Williams noticed him looking through his bag as he asked her if his work "was correct".

She said he suddenly pulled a large kitchen knife from the bag, and stabbed her in her head.

Williams grabbed the knife, pushed the boy back with her legs, and screamed.

She had injuries to her head, back and hands and said the boy looked at her with "pure hatred".

During the sentencing hearing, the court heard Williams did not know if she would be able to return to work.

She will start therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) this week, and said in her victim personal statement that she felt "sadness, anger and guilt" after the incident.

"Sadness is the most predominant, I focus too much on what could have happened to me," she added.

"I'm in disbelief about what's happened."

She said her daughter had "almost been left without a mum".

"I'm scared because I don't know what I'm going to do going forward," she added.

"My fellow teachers and I don't deserve this because we work so hard.

"I didn't ask for this. Leaving teaching should have been my choice to make."

She said she had returned to the school with a colleague during the summer holidays, and had realised how closely she had been "pinned" to the wall behind her desk.

During the trial, a colleague who rushed to help described Williams's screams as "gut-wrenching".

CCTV footage showed the teenager running away from the school after the attack.

He was later detained at his grandmother's house after telling her that "something went" in his head.

The boy told the jury he had brought the knife to school as a "game" with his friends, which involved bringing "random household objects" to see what they could "get away with".

He said the incident was "an accident" and previously pleaded guilty to possessing a bladed article on school premises.

During the hearing on Thursday, he stood in the dock in a blue shirt, with his family in the public gallery.

Matthew Roberts, defending him, said he was of "clean character" and "well behaved" before the incident.

He told the court his client had made "excellent progress" since being in youth detention.

The boy is due to be released after half of the sentence period, but the court heard his release date could be changed depending on potential amendments to the early release scheme.

Sentencing the boy to four-and-a-half years in a youth detention centre, Judge Thomas said it was "pure luck" Williams had not been seriously injured or worse.

"I don't know why you attacked Mrs Williams with that knife, you never told anybody why you did it," the judge said.

"I think it may have been that in some way she had upset you, but I don't know for certain why.

"What I do know for certain is that you took a knife that day to school because you wanted to really hurt her with it."

He added the boy knew he was "bigger and stronger" than Williams.

"It was pure luck that she didn't have far worse injuries, even fatal injuries," he said.

The judge also referred to another school stabbing in south-west Wales, at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman, where a teenager stabbed two teachers and a pupil in April 2024.

"The court have to try and keep teachers safe from attacks," he said.

"This is the second case of a school pupil stabbing a teacher in a school in the last couple of years.

"I want anyone who is ever thinking of doing the same to know what will happen to them."

Jonathan Pritchard, of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), said the incident was a "shocking display of violence" towards a "teacher doing their job".

"The teacher showed great courage in what must have been a terrifying incident," he said.