Woman who shared false information on Southport attack is ‘mortified’

A British businesswoman accused of being the first person to post false information that the Southport stabbings suspect was an asylum seeker who had arrived in Britain by boat says she is ‘mortified’ by what happened. Just hours after three girls were murdered at a Taylor Swift dance workshop last Monday, Bonnie Spofforth posted on X the wrong name of the boy accused of carrying out the attacks.

Before the victims had been identified, Mrs Spofforth, 55, wrote at 4.49pm: ‘Ali Al-Shakati was the suspect, he was an asylum seeker who came to the UK by boat last year and was on an MI6 watch list. If this is true, then all hell is about to break loose.’ The false information, including what is believed to be a fictitious name, spread rapidly around social media, sparking far-right anti-immigration riots across the country.

Since last Monday’s atrocity, Axel Rudakubana (pictured), from the village of Banks, Lancashire, has been charged with the murders of Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Alice Dasilva Aguiar; 10 counts of attempted murder; and possession of a bladed article. Rudakubana, who turned 18 today, was one of two brothers born in Cardiff to Rwandan parents who had migrated to the UK in 2002 in search of a better life.

Responding to the mass rioting that took place in response to the incorrect information spread on social media, Mrs Spofforth told MailOnline: ‘I’m mortified that I’m being accused of this. I did not make it up. I first received this information from somebody in Southport.’ She added: ‘My post had nothing to do with the violence we’ve seen across the country. But I acknowledge that it may have been the source for the information used by a Russian news website.’ 

Ms Spofforth is the managing director of a clothing company and lives in a £1.5million ($1.9m) farmhouse in Cheshire. Ms Spofforth is a prominent campaigner against lockdowns and net-zero climate schemes and had tens of thousands of followers on X before she deleted her account. MailOnline was able to establish her identify after conducting an extensive trawl of X posts featuring the name Ali Al-Shakti which showed that hers was the first.

When challenged about this, Ms Spofforth claimed that she had seen someone else post the name on X but was unable to provide any evidence. Her post was deleted an hour after it appeared but by then the false information was widely repeated by far-right social media activists such as Tommy Robinson and Andrew Tate.

It is also believed to have been used as a source for an article published by the Russian-linked Channel 3 Now website which was extensively retweeted. Channel 3 Now later removed the article and apologised.

Ms Spofforth told The Times: ‘Yes I did [post it]… It was a spur of the moment ridiculous thing to do, which has literally destroyed me. It was just a mistake. I did a really stupid stupid thing, I copied and pasted it from what I saw, and I added the line “if this is true.”‘

She added: ‘I think it is very easy for a situation which is very emotional and very heightened, so you can end up believing what you’re seeing. People should be very careful about putting what they think is true without doing the research.’

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