A 15-year-old boy has been sentenced to at least 13 years in detention after pleading guilty to the murder of 12-year-old Leo Ross in Birmingham, England.

Leo was stabbed in the stomach during an apparently random attack while walking home through Trittiford Mill Park in the Hall Green area last year. He later died in hospital from his injuries.

The defendant—who was 14 at the time of the killing and cannot be named under UK law because of his age—also admitted other violent offences, including two counts of causing grievous bodily harm and assault occasioning actual bodily harm in separate incidents involving different victims prior to Leo’s murder.

In court, the judge described the attack as callous and unprovoked. Leo’s family earlier paid tribute to him as an “amazing, kind, loving” boy whose life was tragically cut short.

Under UK sentencing law, the minimum term of 13 years is the period the teenager must serve before he can be considered for release on licence; he remains subject to supervision thereafter.