Fundraiser for playground in memory of Southport victims Alice da Silva Aguiar and Bebe King reaches £250,000
16 March 2025, 11:07 | Updated: 16 March 2025, 12:53
A commemorative playground is now set to be built in honour of two Southport victims after a fundraiser reached its £250,000 target.
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Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine and Bebe King, six, who were killed along with Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, were killed in an attack at a dance class last year.
Now, a public fundraiser for a commemorative playground at a Southport primary school attended by Alice da Silva Aguiar and Bebe King has reached its goal.
Alice's father Sergio Aguiar and Churchtown Primary School headteacher Jinnie Payne are supporting the playground appeal by running the London Marathon next month.
"I feel like we're doing something great. In the next few years, thousands of children will enjoy that playground," Mr Aguiar said.
"We always said that the school felt like a second home to Alice.
"She would be very proud of us [creating] this playground. I can imagine how happy she would be to see it. I wish she could have enjoyed it," he told the BBC.
Thanking people for their donations, he said: "People are so kind. They come up to me and say 'well done, the playground will be amazing'."
Ms Payne said the building of the playground will be completed by September.
It will also include a performance space and a library.
Alan Bowen, who was Alice's favourite teacher at Churchtown Primary, said he could imagine her on the playground's stage.
"It would be easy to see (her) dancing and performing, singing, twirling her hair and leading everybody else," he said.
He said Alice loved to perform and the stage would provide a "space where children are going to show off their flair, their sass - and Alice had sass in bucketloads".
Further details of the fundraising campaign can be found here.
Axel Rudakubana was jailed for a minimum of 52 years in January for the murders of the three girls and attempted murders of eight other children, class instructor Leanne Lucas and businessman John Hayes.
