Nicholas Prosper: Luton school shooting mastermind who murdered family will have sentence reviewed

The 49-year sentence of triple killer Nicholas Prosper, 19, who murdered his family and was planning a school shooting, has been referred to the under the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme.

after killing his mother Juliana Falcon, 48, and siblings Giselle, 13, and Kyle, 16, as well as in . He had attempted to hide in his cell before the sentencing hearing at Luton Crown Court, but was forced to attend by the judge. Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb told him: "It is not your choice. You have to face the consequences of your actions, to hear the court’s sentence passed in public, and it is important for those who loved your victims to see you sentenced."

On Friday 13 September 2024, Prosper shot his mother and siblings in their home, and brutally stabbed his brother more than 100 times.

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He then hid for just over two hours before flagging down police officers in a nearby street.

Prosper led them to a nearby playing field, where he had hidden a loaded shotgun and 33 cartridges.

The teen killer was able to buy a gun using a fake licence that he had made himself, responding to an advert online to buy the shotgun and cartridges from a legitimate firearms dealer for £600 the day before the triple murder.

Today, an Attorney General Office's spokesman confirmed the Solicitor General has referred Prosper's sentence to the Court of Appeal.
"It will be argued that Prosper ought to have been given a whole life order," the spokesman said.
"It is now for the court to decide whether to increase the sentence."

Rules were changed in 2022 to allow younger defendants aged 18 to 20 to receive whole-life orders in exceptional circumstances, but none of the orders imposed since then have been on criminals in that age bracket.

The judge said that for defendants over the age of 21, whole-life orders can be considered in cases involving two or more murders with a significant degree of premeditation or planning, or where one child is killed with similar pre-planning.

Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb said: "The court may arrive at a whole-life order in the case of an 18 to 20-year-old only if it considers that the seriousness of the combination of offences is exceptionally high, even by the standard of offences which would normally result in a whole-life order.

"This is described accurately as an enhanced exceptionality requirement.

"Despite the gravity of your crimes, it is the explicit joint submission of counsel that a lengthy, finite term will be a sufficiently severe penalty, and this is not such an exceptionally serious case of the utmost gravity where the sentence of last resort must be imposed on an offender who was 18 at the time and is 19 today."

While Prosper was "indisputably a very dangerous young man", the risk to the public was met with a life sentence, she said.

Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb told the court she would not impose a whole-life order because Prosper was stopped from carrying out the school shooting, having murdered his family earlier than he intended after his mother woke up.

He also pleaded guilty as soon as the charges were put to him after psychiatric reports had been completed, and he was 18 at the time of his crimes which is at the lowest end of the age bracket for whole-life terms.

Dr Mullan said at the time: "What exactly does someone have to do in this country to be sent away for life? This was the most serious of crimes - including the murder of two children.

"What is the point of making provision for whole-life orders if they aren't used in cases like this? It makes a mockery of the justice system and is an insult to the victims.

"This is the latest in a series of cases that demonstrate too often there is a gap between what the majority of law-abiding members of the public would see as justice and what the judicial system delivers.

"It was particularly galling to read the judge give to describe as mitigation for the murderer the fact that they didn't succeed in a plan to kill even more people. What kind of logic is that?"