Judge emotional as she jails getaway driver over murders of two innocent boys
Mrs Justice May described Max Dixon and Mason Rist as ‘two good boys from loving homes’ as she jailed Antony Snook for life.
A High Court judge became emotional as she described how two innocent boys were murdered by a gang of armed teenagers out for revenge as she sentenced their getaway driver to life imprisonment.
Mrs Justice May visibly choked as she described Max Dixon, 16, and 15-year-old Mason Rist as “two good boys from loving homes” as she jailed Antony Snook for a minimum of 38 years.
She praised their families for the “dignity and grace” shown during the six-week trial at Bristol Crown Court of Snook, Riley Tolliver, 18, and three teenage boys aged 15, 16 and 17.
“Mason, 15, and Max, 16, had been best friends for a long time,” the judge said.
“These were two good boys from loving homes with their whole lives ahead of them.”
She described the “burning sense of unfairness of the attack on these two boys” who were walking to get food in their community.
“Nothing can undo the dreadful events of that night, or bring Mason or Max back,” she said.
Snook, 45, drove the four teenagers to and from Knowle West as part of a revenge mission after a house in the rival Hartcliffe area was attacked by masked youths.
Max and Mason died from stab wounds after being chased by the four armed teenagers on January 27 this year.
The two boys had been wrongly identified as being responsible for bricks being thrown at the house earlier that evening.
Around an hour after that attack, Snook left the property with two of the boys and picked up the other two in a nearby street before heading to Knowle West.
His Audi Q2 was driven around Knowle West for at least 12 minutes before the attack.
The best friends had left Mason’s home on Ilminster Avenue and were going for a pizza when they were spotted by the defendants, who wrongly believed they were responsible for the earlier attack.
