The father of one of Brianna Ghey’s teenage killers can today be unmasked as a sex offender after exposing himself to girls in his Maserati days before his son went on trial.
Kyle Ratcliffe, whose 16-year-old son Eddie is serving a minimum of 20 years behind bars for the brutal murder of the transgender schoolgirl, also admitted secretly filming a young girl undressing at a water park last summer.
Ratcliffe initially told police the footage of the girl undressing had been sent to him over Snapchat. But after tests found it had been taken using his phone he admitted filming the sick clip.
He had also carried out internet searches during his son’s trial relating to sex acts involving schoolchildren.
Ratcliffe has been jailed for 15 months at Manchester Crown Court after admitting two offences of exposure and one count of taking an indecent photo of a child.
He was sent to prison less than a month after his son Eddie and Scarlett Jenkinson, both 16, were jailed for a minimum term of 22 years and 20 years for murdering Brianna, who was transgender. The body of ‘timid’ Brianna, also 16, was found lying face-down in the mud with 28 stab wounds after the ‘frenzied’ attack at a popular park near Warrington, Cheshire on February 11 last year.
Ratcliffe, 36, admitted exposing himself on two occasions, on November 22 and 23 last year – offences committed just days before his son’s murder trial began at Manchester Crown Court on November 27.
The father of the teenage boy who murdered Brianna Ghey has been jailed for 15 months at Manchester Crown Court after admitting two offences of exposure and one count of taking an indecent photo of a child. Kyle Ratcliffe (above) was sent to prison today less than a month after his son Eddie and Scarlett Jenkinson, both 16, were jailed for a minimum term of 22 years and 20 years
Kyle Ratcliffe admitted secretly filming a young girl undressing at a water park last summer
A mugshot of Kyle Ratcliffe released by Greater Manchester Police
Scarlett Jenkinson (left) and Eddie Ratcliffe (right) murdered Brianna at a popular park near Warrington, Cheshire on February 11 last year
Brianna Ghey, (pictured) was stabbed 28 times in Culcheth Linear Park near Warrington, Cheshire on February 11 last year
The 36-year-old, of Leigh, Greater Manchester, appeared at the same court to admit his guilt and was sentenced to 15 months in prison.
Before Eddie Ratcliffe and Jenkinson were handed life sentences earlier this month, police charged Kyle Ratcliffe, a manager of a truck company who also ran a kickboxing gym, with the three offences on January 17. He was then remanded in custody.
At Eddie Ratcliffe and Jenkinson’s sentencing hearing, trial judge Mrs Justice Yip imposed reporting restrictions which prohibited the media from disclosing the accusations against Kyle Ratcliffe’s, in order to avoid prejudicing his case.
But those restrictions have now been lifted following Kyle Ratcliffe’s guilty pleas.
Ratcliffe was today jailed for 15 months and told he posed a ‘significant risk’ to girls and young women.
It can also now be revealed that Ratcliffe – who ran kickboxing classes which his son was pictured taking part in – has two previous convictions for indecently exposing himself in his car dating back to 2008.
Less than a week before the start of the trial of his son last November, Ratcliffe was driving his Maserati in Salford, Manchester Crown Court heard today.
As he went past a bus stop in Boothstown at about 7.45am on November 22, 2023, two 16-year-old girls waiting to go to college saw him performing a sex act on himself.
Today’s hearing was told that Ratcliffe ‘made eye contact’ with their girls while he was touching himself. Each incident lasted no longer than five seconds.
It was told their parents now felt ‘on edge and concerned for their safety’ as a result.
One of the girls could see that his trousers were ‘down past his knees,’ Michelle Brown, prosecuting, said.
Initially they ‘laughed it off’, but at the same time the following day he drove past and the same thing happened, she said.
Ratcliffe – who did not stop his car on either occasion – seemed ‘confused and frantic’, they said.
One later described the incidents as ‘a violation of her privacy’.
‘Timid’ Brianna’s body was found face-down in the mud in a Cheshire village on February 11 last year
Ratcliffe an a kickboxing gym in Leigh, which he opened last year but has since closed
Photos of Eddie Ratcliffe show an innocent-looking child enjoying a seemingly ordinary upbringing
Teenage Ratcliffe was described as ‘socially awkward’ with a love of animals
Fortunately one of the ‘shocked’ girls had the presence of mind to take a photograph of his numberplate before he drove out of sight.
It was passed to police who traced Ratcliffe at his home in nearby Leigh, and he was arrested on December 15 – midway through his son’s murder trial.
Ratcliffe claimed he often drove with his trousers down due to a need to go to the toilet urgently for medical reasons, Ms Brown said.
But searches of his mobile phone revealed footage he had filmed secretly last August of a girl aged between 12 and 15 getting changed out of her swimming costume at a water park.
Ratcliffe was arrested again last month and remanded in custody – meaning he was not able to be present when his son was jailed on February 2.
Today he pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent exposure and one of taking an indecent photograph of a child.
No family members were present in court, with Ratcliffe appearing on video link from Forest Bank jail.
The court heard he had been convicted of indecently exposing himself while driving his car twice before, in 2008 and in 2012.
He was given a suspended prison sentence after the first occasion and a community order with a requirement to go on a programme addressing his offending behaviour on the second.
His barrister, Mark Friend, said Ratcliffe ‘candidly’ admits that his behaviour last year did him ‘no credit whatsoever’. But he argued it was ‘difficult, if not entirely unrealistic’ to ‘divorce’ the resumption of his sexual offending to the ‘misfortune facing his family’ over the past 12 months.
Jailing him, Judge John Potter told Ratcliffe he clearly had a ‘sexual attraction’ to girls and female teenagers and represented a ‘significant risk’ to them.
He accepted that the murder count which was then hanging over his son would have had ‘an effect’ on him. But he said it provided ‘no excuse whatsoever’ for his behaviour.
Ratcliffe, who nodded and thanked the judge, was put on the sex offenders register for ten years and made subject to a five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.
He was also given a barring order preventing him working with children on his release.
Eddie Ratcliffe, 16, was found equally as guilty of the murder of Brianna Ghey as his female accomplice Scarlett Jenkinson
Ratcliffe was convicted of murder alongside fellow 16-year-old Scarlett Jenkinson, previously known as Girl X
Brianna’s death followed weeks of planning by Ratcliffe and Eddie Jenkinson, who had become obsessed with murder and torture, fuelled by a morbid interest in serial killers.
Following the killing, police discovered the murder weapon, a hunting knife which Ratcliffe had bought on a family holiday to Bulgaria weeks earlier, in his bedroom.
Before the disclosure of Kyle Ratcliffe’s crimes, neighbours who lived near their home in Leigh described the family as pleasant and respectable, and said they ‘kept themselves to themselves’.
Kyle Ratcliffe is the manager of a truck company, and would often be spotted tinkering with vehicles outside the family home.
He was also involved in kickboxing and travelled to Jamaica in 2018 for the Amateur World Championships, where both he and his son competed.
He also ran a kickboxing gym in Leigh, which he opened last year but has since closed.
Today his barrister said he had shown ‘a willingness to address the underlying reasons’ for his crimes.
Mr Friend said Ratcliffe’s wife and two other children had already faced ‘serious consequences’ as a result of their son’s murder conviction.
Their lives were ‘but a shadow of that which they enjoyed prior to February 2023’, he added.
But Ratcliffe had ‘played his own part in that misery’ and therefore left them to face that ‘burden’ alone, he said.
His son Eddie tried to pass himself off as mute as he refused to admit his part in the murder of Brianna Ghey during the trial.
He repeated his claims that he was urinating behind a tree when Jenkinson stabbed the schoolgirl 28 times.
Eddie Ratcliffe, 16, was ‘genius’ level smart and a ‘sociopath’ who friends deemed socially awkward, according to his female accomplice
Eddie Ratcliffe, a former champion kickboxer, was revealed as one of Brianna’s killers
Eddie Ratcliffe brought his own hunting knife (pictured) to the scene which was used to stab Brianna to death
But Eddie Ratcliffe was found equally as guilty of murder as Jenkinson. As jurors heard the grim details of Brianna’s ‘frenzied’ stabbing, he sat in the dock doing puzzles in a Sudoku magazine on his knee.
Head down, pen in hand, he displayed not a flicker as the 999 call played, ruled too distressing to be made public, jurors hearing the breathless words of the horrified dog walker who first came across Brianna’s lifeless body.
Photos of the young Ratcliffe showed an innocent-looking child enjoying a seemingly ordinary upbringing, complete with pets and days out in the countryside.
But what lay beneath the surface was a child ‘genius’ who has taught himself A Level Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Maths and English Literature within the confines of a secure unit.
One source said of the teen: ‘He was a top set student with a small group of friends. He always got good grades, all his school reports were good. His parents described him as a shy, quiet boy who loved animals.’
A former teacher added: ‘I couldn’t believe it when I found out he had been arrested for Brianna’s murder. He’s the last boy in the world I could ever imagine doing something like that.’
In police interviews played to the jury in December, twisted Eddie Ratcliffe tried to claim he was just ‘playing along’ with a ‘fantasy’ dreamt up by Jenkinson who boasted about already having killed people, a court heard.
Ratcliffe, who brought the hunting knife to the scene himself, said he thought Jenkinson was ‘joking’ in a message about killing Brianna.
In a police interview two days after Brianna’s death, Ratcliffe was asked: ‘At what point would it have stopped being a joke?’
He replied: ‘If I’d seen that she was carrying a knife I would have questioned it.’
The officer said: ‘You’re talking about taking a hunting knife out with you.’
Ratcliffe replied: ‘I’m not good at judging what jokes are. I think I go too far with jokes.’
The officer asked: ‘Do you think this joke has possibly gone too far?’
Ratcliffe replied: ‘Yeah. I see it now. But then I didn’t notice it.’