The shocked parents who discovered their son had been exploited by a criminal underworld – but it was far too late

At just 14 years old, Nathaniel Shani enjoyed doing many of the same normal things as teenagers across the country. He was playing on his PlayStation and hanging out with friends. Nathaniel also took pride in his role as an Air Cadet, shining his shoes and ironing his shirt to ensure he looked up to par.

But Nathaniel’s life was brutally and cruelly cut short, after a brief foray into the criminal world, where he was exploited by sophisticated criminals to sell drugs.

Stabbed to death during a petty quarrel, his parents struggle to understand how their son could have gotten into drug trafficking without their knowledge.

LEARN MORE: Two teenagers sentenced to life in prison for the murder of Nathaniel Shani

Broken and devastated by this realization, they attended their son’s murder trial but understandably struggled to listen to the horrific testimony surrounding his killing.

Nathaniel was killed by another young boy, whom he once considered a friend. But Nathaniel’s attempt to “save face” when he was robbed of cannabis he was asked to sell had devastating consequences.

In an interview with the Manchester Evening Newslead detective on the case, DCI Gina Brennand, revealed that the dealer who supplied Nathaniel with the drugs has since been jailed for drug-related offences.

And she said her team’s investigation found Nathaniel had only been involved in drug trafficking for about two weeks before he was murdered.

“If the drugs had not been stolen, the fight would never have happened”

DCI Brennand said: “This street level exploitation, I would say, led to the murder of Nathaniel. If the drugs had not been stolen, the fight would never have happened. This person was the catalyst for Nathaniel’s murder, and his parents would say that.

“Nathaniel’s parents were very interested in who was exploiting their son. You have to look at it this way: this is child exploitation, this is what happened to Nathaniel and his friends, and they don’t have the skills to know otherwise.

“They might think it’s cool, but it’s not. They are simply acting on behalf of someone else and are being exploited. This happens every day, on the streets of city centers across the UK. And that’s why kids start carrying knives.

“It’s horrible, absolutely horrible, it’s devastating.”

She said the recovered messages showed Nathaniel was told he could move into selling cocaine if he did “well” with cannabis.

“These are vulnerable kids who can’t make decisions, who might want money for a new pair of sneakers, and then they start doing things because someone approached them,” said DEI Brennand . “They just don’t make wise decisions, because they’re children.”

In addition to the loss of their son, DCI Brennand said Nathaniel’s parents had questions about whether they could have done anything to help him.

She added: “They look inward and ask themselves ‘what could we have done?’ or “what did we miss?” At least we could tell them that to our knowledge, based on Nathaniel’s telephone testimony, it was such a short period of time, just 14 days before his death, that he began to engage in drug trafficking. cannabis.

“They will always wonder if there was anything they could have done to prevent this, but they didn’t know. You can’t imagine the torment parents go through.

Nathaniel was a student at the Manchester Communication Academy in Harpurhey. He had many friends and was not afraid to defend them if he felt they were being wronged.

It was there that he met the boy who would later murder him. He and Boy A, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, were initially “good” friends. Boy A, the youngest of four children, was having “problems” at school. He was placed on a “staged move” to another school and police say he had demonstrated “violent” behavior that was “escalating”.

Boy A would later claim that he and Nathaniel fell out because of an argument between their mutual friends, in which they both came across different points of view. He said they stopped dating and started fighting with each other. At first it was a “joke,” but later they became “organized,” Boy A said.

It was on September 15, 2023 that the quarrel exploded out of proportion. The theft of cannabis from an associate of Nathaniel’s was the incident that lit the fuse.

Boy B, a friend of Boy A, took a small amount of cannabis from a boy in Tavistock Square, Harpurhey, an area with a shop and takeaway where children hung out. When Nathaniel found out about this, he was angry. These were certain medications that had been provided to him. The day’s events were recounted in Snapchat messages that fueled the fire.

The confrontation and eventual murder was captured on horrific CCTV footage. Nathaniel collapsed after being stabbed in the neck by Boy A.

DCI Brennand and his team were assigned to the case the following day.

“We knew immediately who had stabbed Nathaniel, because he was named by those present at the scene,” she recalls. Boy A was arrested that night. Boy B, who was also convicted of murder after being accused of “encouraging” Boy A, turned himself in the next day.

She explained that in addition to gathering scientific evidence, her team had to speak with other children who had witnessed the horror.

DCI Brennand said: “It’s always very difficult when you have very traumatized children who have seen something they should never see or experience, some of them or their best friends dying before their eyes.

“We knew it had been motivated by street robbery, we knew there had been a precursor that led to the meeting.

“But we didn’t know it was drugs, we were told it was money theft, which is natural when kids are trying to stay out of trouble and hide money. things to their parents.”

As the investigation continued, the circumstances of Nathaniel’s murder became clearer.

“It is not uncommon for children to be exploited by adults for the purpose of street trafficking,” the detective added. “What we established from his phone was that this had probably only been going on for two weeks.

“It was such a short period of time, that’s what makes it even more tragic. His own parents didn’t have the chance to realize what he was doing. They are mortified not to know.

“What we told them as a team was you would have been lucky to know.”

In addition to watching their son’s final moments unfold in minute and graphic detail, Nathaniel’s family also had to watch as his character was questioned.

“You saw a very one-sided view of Nathaniel, based on what was on his phone, and not on who he was as a person, a friend, a son, a student,” DCI Brennand said.

“None of this happened in the legal arena, as the defense focused on attacking his character in order to defend their clients.”

Nathaniel, known to his family as a kind, caring and polite young man, was another young man lost to knife crime. Asked how society can act to stop this phenomenon in the future, DCI Brennand added: “You can’t do it as a single agency. You need parents and families involved, you need municipal video surveillance to be in the right place, you need safety on the streets in the form of places where children can’t hide, you need education at school.

“It seems to me that the number of children who die from a knife wound inflicted by someone of the same age, week after week in the UK, does not matter. This is not a preventative message addressed to children. I think children might be in the best position to ask how to stop this.

“I bet those who saw Nathaniel die won’t carry a knife anymore.”