Life for trio of teen thugs who murdered the 'wrong man'

Three teen thugs who murdered 'the wrong man' after hijacking a dispute which had nothing to do with them were today (Tuesday) handed life sentences.

Kane Adamson, 18, Joshua Prescott, 19, and Ben Dawber, 17, were hunting down a man who had just punched someone outside a bar in Tyldesley but then launched a sickening knife attack on the wrong person.

Thomas Williamson, 30, a man with mental health problems who was out for a walk to clear his head at the time, suffered a series of fatal stab wounds, including one that penetrated his heart and lung. He died at the scene. He was entirely innocent.

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Today the three young men who launched the sickening attack were handed life sentences for murder at Manchester's Minshull Street Crown Court.

Jailing them for life, Judge Maurice Greene told them: "The tragedy is that Thomas Williamson was the wrong man in the wrong place at the wrong time."

In court Mr Williamson's heartbroken mother Susan slammed the lies told by Dawber, who robbed a pizza delivery driver while he was on bail for the murder. Dawber told the jury he acted in self-defence.

Mrs Williamson said of her son: "I miss Thomas so much every day."

On the night of Mr Williamson's murder on September 25, 2021, his three attackers had been looking for another man, David Shuttleworth, who had earlier that night punched another man, Jake Dinning. The trial heard Mr Shuttleworth punched Mr Dinning as he thought the latter had been 'in dispute' with his girlfriend outside Lounge Bar in Tyldesley shortly after 1am.

At the same time the three defendants, said to have been drinking vodka and inhaling nitrous oxide