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The murder of Jimmy Mizen took place on 10 May 2008 when the 16-year-old schoolboy was murdered in Lee Green, London. A 19-year-old youth, Jake Fahri, was arrested and convicted in March 2009 of his murder.

Background

Mizen (9 May 1992 – 10 May 2008) was the son of Barry and Margaret Mizen. He was their sixth son and eighth child. Mizen was 16 years old, 6 feet 4 inches (193 cm) tall and 14 stone (89 kg). He lived in Lee Green and attended St Thomas More Catholic Comprehensive School in Eltham, south east London.

Jake Fahri had a string of convictions involving robbery and violence. On 19 July 2004 he was given a nine month referral order for taking part in a gang knifepoint robbery of a schoolboy at Falconwood station in Bexley, southeast London. On 4 January 2005 he was given a 12 month supervision order for the robbery of an adult in Greenwich Park on 13 April 2004. On 13 April 2006, he was given an 18 month supervision order for an unprovoked assault on a girl in the street and burglary.

The Mizen family had previous dealings with Jake Fahri. In 2001 he walked up to Harry Mizen in the street and asked for money before punching him in the stomach. Harry, who was 10 years old, handed over 20p but told his mother about the incident and she made a complaint to Fahri's school. Two years later, on 1 April 2003, Fahri saw Harry in Woodyates Road, Lee, and demanded to know why he had 'grassed.' Harry tried to escape but Fahri grabbed hold of his shirt and threatened to beat him up before punching him in the chest. Police visited Fahri's home on 7 May 2003, to speak to him about the incident and gave him a harassment warning. The culmination of these events led to the incident in which Jimmy Mizen was murdered, in which Harry Mizen, Jimmy's brother, had been mugged a total of 2 times by Jake Fahri over the course of 6 years, prior to the death of Jimmy.

Harry had turned Jake over to the school on the first count, with Jake proposing to never succumbing to mugging again, and after 5 years, Jake seemed to recognise Harry, mugging him a second time before he was turned over to the police.

At the Bakery years later, Jake recognised Harry, however, set his sights on Jimmy – inevitably causing his death.

Incident

At approximately 11.30 on the morning of Saturday, 10 May 2008, a day after his sixteenth birthday, Jimmy Mizen was inside the Three Cooks Bakery in Burnt Ash Hill, south London, with his brother Harry. Jake Fahri, 19, of Milborough Crescent, Lee, entered the shop and an altercation began when Jimmy Mizen stood up to threats being made against him by Fahri.

5 feet 7 inches (170 cm) Fahri challenged Mizen to go outside the shop but Mizen refused. Not wanting to lose face after picking a fight with Jimmy Mizen, Fahri went back in the shop and hit Jimmy Mizen with two plastic drinks. The Mizen brothers defended themselves and traded punches with Fahri. All three then crashed into a glass cake display, before Fahri was bundled out of the shop.

Fahri then re-entered the shop with a metal-framed advertising sign and started poking Jimmy Mizen with it. Mizen held onto the sign, and in panic Fahri reached for a 12 inch (30 cm) hot glass dish from the counter and threw it at Jimmy Mizen. Shattering on his chin, a one-and-a-half-inch glass shard pierced his neck and severed vital blood vessels. According to witnesses Fahri exited the bakery with a triumphant grin on his face.

Mizen managed to stagger into the rear of the bakery, and into a cupboard, to shield himself from who he thought was Jake returning, where his older brother Tommy, (27 at the time), found him. Jimmy Mizen collapsed in his brother's arms. Their mother Margaret arrived soon after and fainted at sight of her son. She regained consciousness soon after, and called her husband (Barry Mizen) who arrived an hour later, only to find his son had died.

Arrest, investigation and trial

Fahri handed himself into police custody three days later after the attack. In police recordings of his interviews, Fahri commented: "Someone has died because of me. I didn't mean it, I didn't mean to kill him.

Fahri said he panicked when he thought he was losing grip on the advertising sign. Fahri, now crying said: "I can feel it coming out of my hands so I panicked. I looked to my left. There was a tray there. I picked it up and threw it. I didn't mean to hit him, I didn't. I just threw it. I thought he would put his hands up so he'd let go of the sign. All I wanted to do is, I didn't want him to hit me with the sign, so I picked up the dish. I didn't think it would smash and I threw it and it hit him and it hit him. I didn't mean... I didn't mean it to... for that to happen... I didn't mean to hit him. didn't want to hurt him, didn't want to. I might have been lippy at the start, you know, but I didn't mean it to happen."

He said he ran off when Jimmy Mizen let go of the sign. He was challenged by Jimmy's older brother Tommy, 27, outside the shop. Fahri said he only learned of Mizen's death when his mother rang him to explain what had happened.

Fahri said he went in the shop for a sandwich. He changed his mind and turning around saw Mizen was standing in his way. Fahri said: "I've made a step and looked at him to say, you know I'm trying to get past. I didn't get no reaction so I've brushed past him and he's obviously, he took offence to that, and he said 'Don't touch me'."

He then challenged the Mizens's to go outside but re-entered after seeing Harry on the phone summoning Tommy to help.

Fahri was remanded in custody and stood trial for the murder of Jimmy Mizen at the Central Criminal Court on March 11, 2009 before Mr Justice Calvert-Smith and a jury. At his trial, Fahri admitted throwing the glass dish but denied murder.

Crispin Aylett QC, prosecuting, said: "A trivial incident, brought about by the defendant's rudeness, escalated into something horrific. The defendant reached for any and every available weapon with which to attack the Mizen brothers. The whole incident lasted no more than three minutes - three minutes of absolute madness on the part of this defendant."

Pathologist Dr Benjamin Swift told the court that Jimmy Mizen died from loss of blood. A glass shard had severed the carotid artery and jugular veins which were both 0.4in (1 cm) below the skin near the jaw.

However, the jury rejected Fahri's version of events and found him guilty of murder. He was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of fourteen years.

The Jimmy Mizen Foundation

The Mizen family opened a cafe in Hither Green in 2010, a mile away from the bakery where Jimmy Mizen was killed. The Cafe of Good Hope is next door to the headquarters of the Jimmy Mizen Foundation.

The cafe is run by Jimmy Mizen's older brother Billy, who is a trained patissier. Two other brothers Bobby, and Tommy are also involved in the running of the cafe. All proceeds from the cafe go towards running various charity and community projects and for local youngsters to get work experience at the cafe.

In 2010, “The Tablet” named the Mizen family as among Britain’s most influential Roman Catholics.

Wikipedia.org

Grieving parents attack 'Angry Britain' as teenage thug is jailed for life for murder of schoolboy Jimmy Mizen

DailyMail.co.uk

March 28, 2009

They had just seen justice catch up with the swaggering thug who murdered their beloved son.

But Barry and Margaret Mizen refused yesterday to be infected by the rage which cost 16-year-old Jimmy his life.

Instead they made a heartfelt plea for Britain to stop itself becoming a country of ‘selfishness, anger and fear’.

Mrs Mizen said: ‘I don’t feel anger because I know that it was anger that killed my Jimmy and I won’t let anger ruin my family. There is too much anger in this world and it has to stop.’

Jake Fahri, 19, was convicted of murder at the Old Bailey after smashing a glass dish in the face of former altar boy Jimmy in a suburban baker’s shop last May. His victim’s throat was cut and he bled to death.

He was given a life sentence and told he would serve a minimum of 14 years.

Fahri and Jimmy lived near each other in Lee, South-East London. Both came from loving families but they grew up into very different young men. Jimmy was a former altar boy who was always polite and helpful to his neighbours.

Fahri was a cannabis-smoking bully obsessed with violent rap music.

He was wearing his iPod headphones when he exploded with rage over a minor dispute with Jimmy and his brother Harry in the baker’s shop.

He was seen ‘grinning and swaggering’ as he left the scene while Jimmy’s blood spurted over the shop assistants in a scene‘like a horror film’.

Jimmy’s mother arrived soon after – and fainted when she saw her son’s life ebbing away as he was cradled in his older brother’s arms just a day after his 16th birthday.

A ripple of applause passed through the public gallery yesterday as a jury of eight men and four women found Fahri guilty of murder after a two-week trial.

The killer showed no emotion at the verdict and left the dock calling to his weeping mother Shirley: ‘I’ll be all right mum, I’ll be all right.’

Outside court Mr Mizen, 56, trembled with emotion as he said: ‘This country stands apart from most other countries in the world, as a country of civility and fair play, of fairness and safety. We are rapidly losing.

'We are becoming a country of anger, selfishness and fear. It doesn’t have to be like this. Let’s try to stop it.

‘Jimmy stood up to a bully and it cost him his life. I feel this is a good country with traditional values, but we are in danger. Things have got to change.’

The Daily Mail can reveal that Fahri could have been locked away two years ago after being charged with the rape of a 13-year-old girl in 2006.

He was 16 at the time, but the case was discontinued at Camberwell Youth Court in February 2007 after the girl withdrew her evidence, apparently because she was unable to face the ordeal of going to court.

So Fahri remained a free man on May 10 last year when he went to buy a chicken sandwich at the Three Cooks Bakery in Lee.

Jimmy was already there buying sausage rolls with his 19-year-old brother Harry.

As Fahri barged him out of the way in the queue, Jimmy told him: ‘Some manners would not go amiss.’

Fahri stepped out of the shop and snarled at 6ft 4in Jimmy: ‘Think you are a big man? Come outside and I’ll show you how big you are.’

Harry called on his phone for another brother, Tommy, 27, to come and help. Fahri went back in the shop and said: ‘Who are you f***ing calling?’, and used two drink bottles to hit the brothers.

He cornered Jimmy behind the bakery counter and grabbed a foot-long Pyrex dish, hurling it with such force that it broke on impact.

One of the shards of glass cut Jimmy’s carotid artery and jugular vein. As Harry stood by paralysed with shock, Tommy arrived to see Fahri running off.

He found Jimmy by following a trail of blood to a store cupboard where he was slumped.

Tommy was cradling him and trying in vain to staunch the wound when their mother arrived and fainted.

The Victim: Altar boy who became a 'Gentle Giant' who stood up to bullies

Jimmy Mizen was one of nine children born into his devout Roman Catholic family.

He was an altar boy until the age of 14 at Our Lady of Lourdes church near their home in Lee, South-East London.

Jimmy went to state secondary school – St Thomas More – a few miles away from Jake Fahri’s school, Crown Woods.

At 6ft 4in, he was known to many of his friends as the Gentle Giant or the BFG – Big Friendly Giant of the Roald Dahl children’s book.

According to his mother, however, he was ‘not muscly, but skinny’ and a witness who saw Jimmy in the baker’s shop where he died described him as looking ‘awkward’.

Mrs Mizen said: ‘It was a family joke. He would say, “I don’t like being this tall”.’

Jimmy struggled at school – he had special educational needs after contracting meningitis at 14 months, but despite this through hard work he went on to get eight GCSEs.

He was ‘counting the days’ until he would leave school, and was about to start an apprenticeship working at Southwark Council in building services.

But he also worked for extra pocket money with his self-employed father at his locksmith’s shop in Sidcup.

Jimmy was a polite and friendly boy who stood up for the underdog.


His mother said in her impact statement read to the court: ‘He helped kids at school who were bullied, he stood his ground and would stand up for his friends.

'This concerned Barry and I and we thought it would get him in trouble one day.’

Jimmy would mow the lawn of his 87-year- old neighbour and would tend her garden.

He also used to get the shopping for a disabled woman in their parish.

Mrs Mizen remembers how her son once bought a homeless man a bag of chips.

‘This man has left his rug at Jimmy’s memorial outside the bakery as a mark of respect.’

The evening before Jimmy’s death his mother and father had hugged him as they celebrated his 16th birthday.

With seven sons and two daughters ranging in age from Joanne, 37, to nine-year-old George, birthdays were hardly rare events in the Mizen household.

But Barry and Margaret were determined to make Jimmy’s 16th special. ‘We stood in a circle and had a three-way cuddle,’ said Mr Mizen.

‘He looked lovely in his new clothes and we told him we loved him.’

Smiling, Mrs Mizen added: ‘And he told us that he loved us. We gave him a card that said, “I.O.U. one fare to California”.

‘We could not normally do that for a birthday with the size of our family. It was a one-off. He was so pleased.’

As a further treat, Jimmy was given the following day off from working in his father’s shop.

Because at 16 he was now legally allowed to play the lottery, he went out with brother Harry that Saturday morning to buy his first ticket – and ran into Jake Fahri.

Describing the effect of the murder on the family, Mr Mizen said their youngest son, George, who used to share a room with Jimmy, now had to sleep on a mattress in his parents’ room.

‘It’s made him very anxious. He hasn’t been able to sleep in his own bed since this happened.

'The poor little fella will sleep on a mattress on our floor, he wants the windows shut, and the curtains drawn.’

Their daughter Samantha, 22, who has Down’s Syndrome and who the Mizens see as ‘their special gift’, is now fearful that members of her family will go out and not come back – like Jimmy.

‘Every time we go out, her response is always the same since Jimmy died,’ said Mr Mizen.

‘She says as a question, “Come back?” to us. She always runs through the names of her siblings with the same two words, “Come back”.

‘Obviously this is in response to the fact Jimmy went out and didn’t come back. We can only reassure her.’

Mr Mizen said of Jimmy: ‘He was the shining star in our family. He was polite, courteous and always seemed to be happy.

He enjoyed life. His loss is immense, not only to us but to all his friends and family.

‘We are so proud to have been his parents. Jimmy will always be remembered with a smile. God bless you, Jimmy.’

Detective Chief Inspector Cliff Lyons said outside court: ‘Jimmy Mizen was an immaculate and decent young man. We all would aspire to have a son like him.’

The killer: 'Lovely' lad turned into a gangsta rap thug hooked on skunk

As Jake Fahri stood in the dock of the Old Bailey, he could hardly have looked more clean-cut. His goatee and sideburns had been shaved off and in his smart black jacket, spotless white shirt and striped tie, he could almost have been in school uniform.

In reality, Fahri, who went by the street name Detz, was a small-time thug and a bully expelled from school at 15 for a ‘happy slapping’ attack.

He aspired to a ‘gangsta’ lifestyle of easy money earned from selling drugs, and treating any disrespect with extreme violence – including attacking women.

Born in Greenwich, South-East London, to Mustafa, 43, a heating engineer and Shirley, 37, a receptionist, he grew up with his younger sister in a smart £350,000 terrace home.

By the time he entered adolescence, he had become obsessed with rap music and smoking skunk cannabis. His hero was Tupac Shakur – who voiced praise of ‘the thug life’ and was shot dead in Las Vegas.

Fahri himself recorded a CD of rap music called ‘Dirty Money Vol 1’, including a track called ‘If only U knew’ – about how his mother had no idea about his criminal lifestyle.

One neighbour said: ‘As a youngster he was a lovely lad who would often come over and play with my dog.

‘But as he grew up I saw another side to him. He got a job delivering the local free paper and one day he decided he couldn’t be bothered to drop them all into our letterboxes, so he dumped a whole pile of them on the side of the road.

‘When one of the neighbours asked him what he was up to, he just got a mouthful of abuse and had the paper trolley thrown at him.’

By the age of 11, Fahri had already shown his bullying streak. He robbed Jimmy Mizen’s brother, Harry, of 20p. Harry told his mother, who informed a teacher.

Two years later, he attacked Harry again, later telling police that he did it because ‘he called him a poof’. He admitted the crime because his solicitor advised him to. Ever since that incident, he bore a grudge against the Mizen family.

At the age of 16, Fahri’s foul temper once again erupted in violence.

He poked a girl in the face before slapping her several times, spitting in her face, and then kicking her legs from under her – causing her to hit her head as she fell.

He admitted common assault, was made the subject of a supervision order and ordered to pay his victim £50 compensation.

At around the same time he was kicked out of his state comprehensive, Crown Woods in Eltham, where he was involved in a so-called ‘happy slapthat-ping’ attack – hitting another pupil while another one filmed it. Police said that there was a ‘long list’ of pupils whom Fahri had bullied.

In July 2004 he was part of a gang who robbed a schoolboy at knifepoint. He was given a 12-month supervision order. The following year, Fahri and another youth grabbed the bag of an adult in a park.

In 2007, a charge of rape was dropped at Camberwell Youth Court after his alleged victim, aged just 13, decided not to give evidence.

On the day of the murder Fahri had driven his girlfriend, Tania Pham, 19, to work in Bromley.

Immediately after killing Jimmy, he told a friend, Damien Heaven, street name Spider, that he had ‘a craziness, a madness’ in the baker’s shop.

The run for three days after the attack he hid at the home of a friend’s elderly relative-Before handing himself in to police he went to the Greenwich Holiday Inn and hired an £89 room for 20 minutes of passion with Miss Pham – no doubt aware that he could be spending a long time inside.

He paid cash and used a false name.

Yesterday as Fahri was convicted and Jimmy Mizen’s mother cried tears of relief, Shirley Fahri slumped forward, holding her head in her hands.

She had sobbed in court when Fahri was in the witness box, where he wove a pack of lies, insulting Jimmy Mizen’s memory by claiming that he was the aggressor.

Mr Justice Calvert Smith told Fahri: ‘A trivial incident over absolutely nothing in a High Street bakery ended three minutes later with the death of a blameless young man.

‘Although you had two clear opportunities to reflect on what was a situation that was getting dangerously out of hand, you chose to go back into the baker’s shop on the third occasion determined to cause very serious injury to Jimmy Mizen who you felt had disrespected you.

‘In fact tragically you carried out your intentions so successfully that you killed him and deprived a loving family of a son and a brother.’

Jimmy Mizen murder trial: Brother tells of moment Jimmy bled to death after bakery fight

Mirror.co.uk

March 16, 2009

The brother of schoolboy Jimmy Mizen told a jury today of the moment his sibling was fatally injured during an alleged attack in a bakery.

The 16-year-old died in a pool of blood on the floor of a baker's shop in Lee, south London, last May.

His elder brother Harry, now 19, alleged that Jake Fahri, 19, hurled a glass oven dish at his brother following a row in the Three Cooks Bakery near his home in Lee.

He told Crispin Aylett QC, prosecuting, that Fahri had initially thrown an advertising sign at the two brothers while inside the shop.

Mr Mizen, giving evidence at the Old Bailey, said the sign had missed the two of them so Fahri then picked up a glass oven dish from the hot food counter of the bakery.

He alleged that Fahri then threw the dish at Jimmy Mizen while standing "no more than a metre" from him.

Mr Aylett said: "What was the next thing that you saw or heard?"

Mr Mizen replied: "I turned round and saw blood. There was lots of blood."

Asked how fast the dish had been thrown he replied: "It was thrown hard."

Mr Aylett asked how long the gap was from the dish being thrown and Mr Mizen seeing blood on his brother.

He replied: "Seconds."

Mr Mizen told the court that Fahri fled the bakery following the alleged attack.

He explained: "I looked around and saw all the blood on the floor. He was out of the shop by then."

Fahri of Milborough Crescent, Lee, denies murder.

Harry Mizen told the court that Fahri had targeted him twice in the years preceding the bakery attack.

In 2001, while Mr Mizen was a Year Seven student, Fahri had demanded money from him, and punched him in the stomach on his way home, he said.

The incident led to Harry Mizen 's mother contacting her son's school.

Then two years later Mr Mizen said he was again approached by Fahri who he alleges punched and kicked him.

Mr Mizen explained: "Again I was coming home from school, he approached me and was basically saying that I had grassed on him to my mum who had told my school."

Mr Mizen described his brother Jimmy as an "outgoing normal 16-year-old, we were very close".

On the morning of the bakery attack the pair had visited a nearby newsagents so Jimmy Mizen could buy his first ever lottery card as he had celebrated his 16th birthday on the previous day.

His brother said they had gone into the Three Cooks Bakery to buy sausage rolls. Jake Fahri was already inside the shop.

On seeing the two brothers behind him, Fahri had told Jimmy Mizen to "get out of the way".

Harry Mizen said that his brother had replied that if Fahri "said please" he would step aside.

He explained: "Jake became very aggressive, he stood in front of Jimmy right in front of his face."

Mr Mizen said that he tried to step in to diffuse the situation but Fahri responded by pointing a car key directly in his face.

He explained: "He said that he remembered me, he said 'You grassed on me to the police'."

At this point one of the bakery staff asked Fahri to leave, on exiting the premises, Mr Mizen said that Fahri said to the brothers that "he was going to wait for us outside the shop because he wanted to give us a slap".

Mr Mizen told the packed courtroom that he then called his older brother Tommy to come to the shop to help.

Asked to explain why he made the call he said: "I was scared about what was going on."

Fahri then returned to the shop demanding to know who Harry Mizen had been calling.

The trio continued to row with Mr Mizen telling the court that Fahri threw two bottles of soft drink at the brothers.

They then cornered Fahri and Mr Mizen admitted that both he and his brother began punching him before pushing him out of the shop.

Moments later Fahri returned to the shop kicking through a glass panel in the door as he made his way inside.

Mr Mizen said that Fahri then picked up the advertising sign and rushed at the two brothers while holding it.

Mr Aylett asked: "Did he do anything with it?"

Mr Mizen replied: He threw it towards us."

After missing the two brothers with the sign, Fahri then picked up an oven dish containing sausages from the hot food display cabinet, Mr Mizen said.

He gestured to the jury how he believed Fahri had picked up the dish with both hands and launched it at shoulder height at his brother.

Under cross examination, Sally O'Neill, prosecuting said that Fahri had not picked up the dish with two hands as both he and Jimmy Mizen had been grappling with the sign.

She said that Fahri had instead grabbed the dish with one hand and "slung it" in the direction of Mr Mizen.

Harry Mizen insisted that her account was wrong.

The jury was shown a police video detailing the aftermath of Jimmy Mizen's death.

Broken shards of glass and discarded sausages littered the floor, police identification tags could clearly be seen highlighting areas where blood had been spilled.