Three men jailed for combined 81 years for murder of Leeds teenager

Jozeffi Jeffers, Phillip Bryant and Emile Riggon have been jailed for a combined 81 years. Credit: West Yorkshire Police

Three men who murdered a teenager before dragging his naked body into a street have been jailed.

Nineteen-year-old Emmanuel Nyabako was stabbed 17 times, including with a machete, after being chased as he rode an e-bike in Leeds.

A trial at Leeds Crown Court heard that he was on the bike in Chapeltown with another youth on 26 August last year when he was told he was "not welcome" in the area.

Shots were fired from the bike, resulting in a chase involving two vehicles being driven by Jozeffi Jeffers, 28, and Phillip Bryant, 33.

They caught Mr Nyabako in a garden and started to attack him, along with accomplice Emile Riggon, 23.

The court heard Mr Nyabako suffered injuries to his back, leg and buttock as well as defensive wounds.

Emmanuel Nyabako was chased before being attacked. Credit: Family handout

His attackers then stripped his body and dragged him to Frankland Place.

The youth who had been riding the e-bike had managed to escape before the attack by hiding in the cellar area of a house nearby.

Bryant was arrested five days after the murder. Jeffers was arrested more than two months later, on 14 November.

Riggon fled to Turkey via Ireland before being arrested on 28 November.A fourth suspect, Louis Grant, 28, also known as Louis O-Brien, remains at large.

Louis Grant is still at large. Credit: West Yorkshire Police

Bryant, Jeffers and Riggon pleaded not guilty to murder but were convicted following a trial.

The court heard a statement from Mr Nyabako's mother Jacqueline, who said the family are "forever changed".

She told the court: "Our lives were shattered by the senseless act that took Emmanuel from us. I am adrift in an ocean of sorrow, leaving me struggling to catch my breath."We loved each other and were close. His laughter was a light in our home and lives. The void left by his absence is immeasurable and the silence where his voice once was is deafening. His physical absence is a constant source of pain."

Jeffers, Bryant and Riggon were each given life sentences with minimum terms of 27 years.

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