Damilola Taylor's 'kicking timebomb' killer
ALL attempts to change the mind of Rickie Preddie during his years behind bars have been met with failure and blank refusal.
The 23-year-old still shows no remorse for the way he stabbed little Damilola Taylor with a broken bottle and left him bleeding to death in a stinking stairwell on a south London housing estate.
Preddie is due to walk free on September 6 and senior police and prison offi cers who fear the “ticking timebomb” could kill again are powerless to halt his release.
Yesterday a very worried senior prison service source admitted: “There is a huge level of concern within both the prison service and the Metropolitan Police that Preddie will commit more violent offences on his release. He showed no remorse at his trial and he has shown none while serving his sentence.
He has a long record of nasty violence from as young as eight years of age. I have heard the phrase ‘ticking timebomb’ used to describe his personality but there is nothing that can be done to block his release because of the rules attached to his sentence. There are real fears still poses a high risk to the public.”
The Sunday Express has learned that all attempts to rehabilitate Preddie, who stabbed Damilola with a broken bottle, have failed. He and his brother Danny, now 22, were convicted of the manslaughter of 10-year-old Damilola in Peckham, south London in 2000. Prison service sources have revealed Preddie, who was judged not to be suitable for parole halfway through his sentence, chose not to take part in offender behaviour programmes while serving his time at the Portland Young Offenders’ Institute in Dorset.
It is also understood that his potential for violence has ruled him out of some offender rehabilitation programmes in order to protect other inmates. Unlike many violent offenders he has not had to convince a Parole Board panel of his remorse or suitability to be released back into the community because he did not receive a public protection sentence.
He was sentenced to a fixed term of eight years, with time he had spent on remand taken off. Under rules in force at the time he is now entitled to automatic release after serving two- thirds of his sentence. Today, however, a judge would have a wider range of sentencing options that could be used to keep him in prison longer to protect the public.
Preddie’s release on licence into a secure probation hostel in London means he will be subject to strict conditions including a curfew, but he will also be free to work and roam the streets. Damilola was set upon by Preddie, then aged 13, and his brother Danny, then 12, as the schoolboy made his way home on a Peckham housing estate.
The brothers were leading members of a street gang called the Young Peckham Boys which targeted young children on their way home and threatened them with violence before stealing their mobile phones and other possessions. Danny and Rickie were convicted at the Old Bailey in 2006, following three previous trials and two police investigations. Danny could be eligible for release next year.
