'The real me is evil': Elianne Andam's killer Hassan Sentamu was troubled child with history of violence
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Teenage killer Hassan Sentamu confessed to a friend “the real me is evil, dark and miserable" just a few weeks before he stabbed to death schoolgirl Elianne Andam. He had a history of violence and making threats against other children before he carried out the shocking and deadly knife attack on 15-year-old Elianne.
At the Old Bailey on Thursday, Sentamu – now 18 – was found guilty of murdering Elianne by stabbing her repeatedly outside the Whitgift Centre in Croydon in September 2023. The murder shocked the nation, as it emerged that fun-loving Elianne had simply been standing up for her friend in a row over a teddy bear when her life was ended in a devastating outburst of violence.
Elianne was smiling and joking in the moments before she was stabbed, and fell victim to Sentamu’s “white hot anger” at a perceived humiliation at the hands of a girl. What Elianne and her friends did not know was that Sentamu had a troubled childhood upbringing and there had been repeated warning signs in his past that he was prone to violent outbursts.
He was referred to mental health services as a younger child when primary school staff reported their concerns that he was self-harming, and he had carried out attacks on other primary school with pushes and slaps. Born in Uganda in 2006, Sentamu moved to London at around the age of three with his mother after his father faced claims of domestic abuse, his trial heard.
