Aspiring rappers jailed for plot to murder pregnant girl

By John-Paul Rojas

Saturday, December 05, 2009

A TEENAGE rapper who pushed a pregnant 15-year-old girl into a canal and grinned as he held her under the water was jailed for 18 years yesterday.

Kingsley Ogundele hatched a plan to kill the teenager with his friend Brandon Jolie, who was given a 14-year sentence.

Jolie feared the victim, who was his girlfriend, stood in the way of his burgeoning stardom on the "grime" music scene, the Old Bailey heard. He and Ogundele, both 19, plotted the attempt to kill her during a "chilling" webchat in October last year.

The following month Jolie lured her by phone to an isolated spot beside the Regent’s Canal in Islington, north London, where his friend was waiting. Ogundele hit her over the head with a metal pole and, despite her cries of "Please don’t, I’m pregnant", pushed her into the canal and held her underwater.

Her life was saved by a passerby who chased off the attacker and pulled her out of the water. She later gave birth to a healthy boy.

Ogundele, of Romford, Essex, was convicted of conspiracy to murder by an Old Bailey jury and Jolie, of Bow, east London, earlier admitted the charge.

Judge Paul Worsley told Jolie: "You feared that your mother would cut off your student allowance, that your blossoming music-producing ambitions would be frustrated and that your lifestyle would be severely disrupted [by having a child]. Those selfish concerns gnawed away at you and you explained your problems to Ogundele.

"Ogundele suggested that she should be eliminated. Together you decided that she should be murdered, together with her unborn child. The conversation in which you planned that was captured on Ogundele’s computer. It is chilling."

The victim – who cannot be named because of her age – was six months pregnant. On the day she thought she was meeting Jolie she was left waiting for him by the canal "cold and frightened" before Ogundele hit her and pushed her into the freezing water.

The judge told Ogundele: "She felt she was going to die. One of her last memories as she went under was the grin on your face as you pushed her under."

The judge awarded £500 to Andrew Hall, the passerby who saved her, saying: "Instead of passing by on the other side he went and tackled this young man, who ran off."

Garry Green, for Jolie, said he was a respected music producer and had been starting a degree in TV production.

The court heard that his music had been used in a film called Adulthood as well as on EastEnders and he had also recorded a track for Nike.

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Saturday, December 05, 2009