The young sons of a woman who died in a crowd crush at the O2 Academy in Brixton are starting to ask: “Where is my mum?”
Rebecca Ikumelo’s boys, aged five and seven, are beginning to realise their mother isn’t coming home, her family members have said.
Ms Ikumelo, 33, of Newham, east London, and security worker Gaby Hutchinson, 23, of Gravesend, Kent, who was on duty at the south London venue, both died days after being hurt when ticketless fans tried to get into a show by Nigerian Afrobeats artist Asake in December.
A 21-year-old woman is still seriously ill in hospital.
Their grieving families are searching for answers as to how the crush happened and have now appealed to the public to help with a police criminal investigation into the deadly incident.
‘They are really feeling their mum’s absence’
Ms Ikumelo’s father, Anthony, said the family wanted to see a basic sense of “compassion” and “respect” from everyone involved to aid the investigation into what went wrong on 15 December.
Organising more concerts and events instead – while there are still safety concerns – would be a “further slap” to the relatives, he added.
Mr Ikumelo added one of the reasons his daughter died was “greed” and lamented the lack of safety measures on the day.
He said: “It feels like greed is one of the reasons why my daughter died and why all the things that should have been in place for safety were not there.
“This is why everyone should be working with us, from the government down, to find out what happened and to prevent it from happening again.
“We want those responsible prosecuted and eventually we want the government to make sure this will not happen to another family again.”
Yetunde Olodo said Ms Ikumelo’s young sons – her grandsons – are missing their mum.
She explained: “They don’t understand what is happening but I am sure they are really feeling their mum’s absence.”
Questions over safety and security need to be answered, according to Ms Ikumelo’s aunt Mary, who said it was “a stampede and it is not the first time this has happened in the UK”.
She said extra safety measures should be put in place at future events.
She added: “We are very angry and upset.
“The people who think that maybe they are going to get away with this – they need to be scared because we will never stop as a family until justice prevails.”
Sale of ‘dodgy’ tickets contributed to tragedy
The other victim of the crush was 23-year-old security worker Gaby Hutchinson and her family also have many unanswered questions.
“Why was she inside? Why was there so many people? Why were there so many people turning up? The venue was full and you have got people outside wanting to get in,” said her mother Chris.
Her daughter was “trained to walk around the [venue’s] perimeter and that was it,” she added.
While Ms Hutchinson’s sister Nina said: “She did not die because of an accident like a car accident. She died at work and that should not have happened.”
She added: “I hope that for the people who were selling supposedly dodgy tickets that was worth it to them because ultimately it is [part of] what led to my sister’s death.
“There would not have been that excess of people there who did not have tickets, if you did not do that.”
The family feel “fear” of concerts and similar events ever since Ms Hutchinson’s death, her sister added, and they now tried to avoid crowds.
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Police investigation update
Metropolitan Police Detective Chief Inspector Nigel Penney said the criminal investigation was under way and potential offences being looked into included “corporate manslaughter, criminal negligence manslaughter… health and safety at work offences, along with violent disorder”.
Mr Penney said the police “are looking at every avenue to establish exactly what went wrong” and “have persons of interest” they are probing.
He appealed to the “hundreds of people” at the event capturing the scenes on their phones saying, “however insignificant it is, we want people to come forward with whatever they have”.
