Damilola four deny murder

Four teenage boys denied murdering 10-year-old Damilola Taylor when they appeared at the Old Bailey today.

The boys, one a 14-year-old and the others aged 16, also denied assault with intent to rob and a fresh charge of manslaughter.

Damilola bled to death on a first-floor stairwell on the North Peckham estate after being stabbed in the leg on 27 November 2000.

The Nigerian-born boy was attacked as he made his way home from a computer class after school.

Damilola's father, Richard, was in court as the charges were read out. Beside him sat the Nigerian High Commissioner.

Several days have been set aside for legal argument and a jury will be sworn in next Tuesday. The trial is expected to last at least three months.

Special arrangements have been made for the trial in Court 12. The defendants, who cannot be named because of their ages, will not have to sit in the dock. They will be seated at a table in the well of the court with a member of their family and their legal representatives. The dock will be occupied by journalists covering the trial.

Trial judge Mr Justice Hooper and the barristers will not wear their traditional wigs or gowns in an effort to make the proceedings as informal as possible. The arrangements have been made under the Lord Chief Justice's recommendations for trials of children and young persons.

A media annexe has also been set up in the Old Bailey with a live television link to an adjoining courtroom where disgraced Tory peer Jeffrey Archer was tried last summer.