Sister of Yousef Makki urges overhaul of justice system after stabbed teen’s courtroom ‘character assassination’ whereas dad and mom had been left marginalised

The sister of public schoolboy Yousef Makki who was stabbed to death by his friend has made a powerful plea for an overhaul of the criminal justice system.

Jade Akoum said her 17-year-old Anglo-Lebanese brother’s background from a Manchester council estate, musical taste and love of sport – boxing, in particular – were ‘weaponised’ in a ‘character assassination’, wrongly portraying him as the aggressor during the trial of his killer.

Joshua Molnar, also 17 at the time and from a wealthy family, was cleared of both murder and manslaughter over the fatal confrontation in Hale Barns, Greater Manchester, on March 2, 2019, claiming self-defence.

In a heartfelt speech, Ms Akoum told how her experience shattered her faith in the justice system.

She said: ‘Before 2019, our family had never set foot inside a criminal court nor had any involvement with the police at all.

‘We had been raised to trust the system and we had full confidence in the British justice system and that it would deliver and hold accountability.

‘We walked into the court hopeful that the truth would matter, we walked out devastated that it didn’t.’

The 35-year-old, speaking during a discussion about inequalities in the criminal justice system at Manchester University, asked: ‘What do you do when the process itself is flawed, when it silences you, when it strips your loved one of dignity?

‘Why are some victims portrayed more sympathetically than others? Why are certain backgrounds, certain accents, certain postcodes, treated with suspicion and bias?

‘And why in a system meant to deliver justice do so many families walk away feeling betrayed?

‘Why is character assassination still used so effectively in courtrooms especially against young victims of working class backgrounds?’

She added: ‘What happened in our case should force us to ask some difficult questions.

‘We owe it not just to Yousef but to every person who believes in fairness to demand better from our justice system.’

Describing the ordeal of the trial, she said there was no chance to counteract the ‘character assassination’ with positive evidence about her high-achieving brother, who wanted to be a heart surgeon.

A request for the scholarship pupil’s headteacher at the prestigious Manchester Grammar School – where her brother was achieving top grades – to give a statement was ignored.

She said her family was marginalised – to the extent her late mother Debbie, who had crippling arthritis, and Yousef’s father Ghaleb, who was on crutches – had to watch from an upstairs gallery.

Sat behind a glass screen, they struggled to hear what was going on, had no privacy and a lack of contact with the prosecution meant they felt they could not challenge inaccuracies in how Yousef was portrayed by the defence.

At one stage during the trial, police bodycam footage showing attempts to save the teenager’s life at the scene was accidentally played without warning – leaving Ms Akoum having to ‘run out of the court to be physically sick’.

‘That was when I realised we mattered so little,’ she said.

Attacking the skewed portrayal of her brother as ‘angry and confrontational’, Ms Akoum said: ‘They had painted a picture of him that was so far from the truth, as if his background made him unworthy of protection.

‘His passion was boxing. This was used to portray him as the aggressor.’

She said his differences and achievements in coming from the Burnage council estate – where Noel and Liam Gallagher of Oasis grew up – and achieving a scholarship to attend a prestigious school ‘were not celebrated but weaponised at the trial’.

Molnar’s acquittal in July 2019 – although he was jailed for 16 months after admitting lying to police and possessing a knife in public – meant Debbie Makki’s victim statement was never read.

Then, there was the ‘exhausting and humiliating’ battle to raise funds for representation for a later inquest in 2021 as they had no right to legal aid.

Disappointment followed, with the coroner recording a narrative verdict, finding ‘insufficient evidence’ to record Yousef’s death as either accidental or unlawful killing.

Yousef’s family battled on, going to the High Court which quashed the verdict and ordered a second inquest. 

Ms Akoum said she ‘didn’t dare hope for a positive outcome’ after so many years of disappointment. 

But finally, in November 2023, the new coroner found Yousef was unlawfully killed by Molnar, from a wealthy background, who had inflicted a six-inch wound through his victim’s heart.

The coroner found there was no evidence to suggest Yousef had a weapon – a claim by his expensive defence team at the criminal trial – and savaged Molnar’s ‘self-serving’ claims.

The case became one of the most notorious in recent years and was featured in two television documentaries on Channel 4 and the BBC. 

Fellow Manchester Grammar School pupil Adam Chowdhary, who Yousef had been staying with for the weekend and was present when he was stabbed, maintained he had not seen what happened between Yousef and Molnar. Chowdhary, from a wealthy family in Hale Barns, was jailed for four months for possessing a knife.

But the coroner called Chowdhary, also 17 at the time, an ‘unimpressive witness’ and ‘somewhat afraid’ of Molnar, who lived with his company director parents in Hale but is now of Knutsford, Cheshire.

Mother-of-four Ms Akoum, supported at the talk by her husband Mazen Akoum, 39, said that although the verdict in the second inquest was ‘amazing and wonderful’, ‘it’s not justice, really’.

She said: ‘The defendant couldn’t be tried again, we had answers but no accountability.’

The promised Hillsborough Law will give bereaved families a right to a parity of legal representation at inquests when the state is involved. It may apply to similar cases as Yousef’s in the future as police were represented at both inquests into his killing.

But Ms Akoum hopes for change in the criminal courts in terms of how cases are handled in the future and how bereaved families are treated.

She said: ‘Yousef’s story is not just about one life lost, it’s about what happens when accountability falters, when justice bends for some but not for others’.

Such was the physical and emotional toll that Mrs Makki died of sepsis after becoming unwell only 14 months after her son’s death – while Ms Akoum had a stroke.

Ms Akoum said: ‘We were pulled into a world of procedure and questions when our hearts were already so heavy. No family should have to balance their pain with the weight of fighting to be heard’.

Speaking after Ms Akoum, Pete Weatherby, of Garden Court Chambers, who represented Yousef’s family at both inquests, said: ‘The question that Jade poses, what went wrong, can be answered to some degree in three short words, race and class.

‘Yousef was a high-achieving young man who was destined for great things. He was nearing his A Levels and was going to go to university.

‘The criminal trial misrepresented the boy, the young man he was becoming

‘His life was tragically cut short by a boy from an extremely privileged family who, in a fit of temper, stabbed Yousef who was at the time trying to help him.’

A Greater Manchester Police spokesperson said: ‘We understand the frustration and the added distress felt by Jade and Yousef’s loved ones throughout this ordeal.

‘We have always expressed our commitment to get justice for Yousef’s family and have worked to support them throughout the criminal justice process. Our thoughts will always remain with them.’

The Ministry of Justice said its ‘thoughts are with Jade Akoum following the devastating loss of her brother’.

Officials are to consult on an improved Victims’ Code ‘in due course’ to ensure better support through the court process.

A spokesperson said: ‘We do not ever want victims to feel distressed by their experience in court.’

HM Courts and Tribunals Service is also upping spending on maintenance of neglected court buildings – including Manchester Crown Court where Molnar was tried – to £148.5m this year, from £120m last year. 

A Crown Prosecution Service spokesperson said: ‘Our thoughts remain with Yousef Makki’s family for the devastating loss they have suffered.

‘Decisions about whether to allow character evidence to be considered at a trial are made by the Court and always based on the facts of the specific case, and in this trial we challenged the defence’s efforts to introduce bad character evidence about Yousef Makki.

‘We are improving how we engage with bereaved families and earlier this year established a forum of bereaved family members to make sure our approach is informed by the people most affected by such loss.’

The CPS said introduction of ‘positive character evidence’ for a deceased person would have been ‘highly unusual’ – and that it ‘asserted a positive case that Yousef was not in possession of a knife at the time of the attack and that he did not threaten the defendant’. 

Officials said they are ‘exploring what improvements it can make to the service it provides to those bereaved through crime’.