The family of a church minister’s son stabbed to death in the street today said they had forgiven the three gang members found guilty of his murder - but they should still be jailed for life.
David Headlam, 18, was walking home to Willesden Green with a friend in the early hours when he was stabbed three times in the thigh last June.
Idris Daud, 19, T’Shai Ennis, 19, and Ayman Koshin, 18, ordered a minicab to circle the area until they spotted David. They pursued him for more than 400m and cornered him in the doorway of a house in Harlesden.
David, the son of Pentecostal church leader Bishop Alonzo Headlam, pleaded “don’t stab me, don’t kill me”. The motive remains a mystery but officers later found a video of Ennis rapping about violence and avoiding the police. Koshin, Daud and Ennis denied involvement in the stabbing but were each found guilty of murder at the Old Bailey on Monday.
At the family’s £1.5 million home David’s mother Mernel told the Standard: “My son was innocent. He was chased down and killed by a gang.
“We have forgiven them but it has been so hard. They have been cowards. They have never showed remorse. It would help us if they were honest and told us why they did it. I just hope they get the time inside they deserve. If it’s a life sentence it should mean life.
“They carried a knife, they took away my son’s life.” She added: “My son didn’t carry a knife, I always told him of the dangers. Parents need to talk to their sons about knives.”
David’s brother Dwayne, 34, a social worker said: “Nothing can bring my brother back. We all wear bracelets to remember David. They say ‘ funny, loving and kind’. Those are the three words we think of when we remember him.”
David, a keen footballer and Chelsea fan, studied plumbing at the College of North West London and dreamed of running his own business.
Ennis, of Slough, and Daud and Koshin, both of Wembley, will be sentenced on April 24.
