Hoodie-wearing teenager who killed friend will be in jail for just a year

Lloyd Chapman's 16-year-old son Michael died after his head was kicked "like a football" by Lee Cowie in a unprovoked attack.

The callous killer celebrated what he had done by going out for a kebab with three friends.

At the trial, the court heard that Cowie and Michael were friends but fell out two weeks before the attack over rumours that Michael was cheating on his girlfriend.

Cowie, 19, smirked yesterday as he was sentenced to four years in a young offenders' institution after admitting manslaughter.

But because he has already served almost a year behind bars, he will be automatically released in little more than 12 months - when he has served half his sentence.

Michael's grief-stricken father described the punishment as "absolutely disgusting".

Mr Chapman, 50, said: "Is that what Michael's life is worth - just over one year, two years in total? This is not justice. There is no re-building my life now. My life is over. There is just no future."

He added: "Cowie was laughing. But it is a living nightmare for us. This has devastated our family."

Michael was walking with his brother David and their respective girlfriends through woods close to a cricket field in Sittingbourne in Kent on June 16 last year when he was ambushed by Cowie.

Cowie was acquitted of murder at a trial at Maidstone Crown Court in April. He had admitted manslaughter at a previous hearing.

He was 18 at the time of the attack, which happened as Michael was sitting his GCSEs.

A second defendant, a 16-year-old Afghan refugee who cannot be named for legal reasons, was acquitted of murder and manslaughter.

Cowie came back to the court yesterday for sentencing.

Judge Andrew Patience described the attack as "cowardly" but said sentencing guidelines meant he could not impose a harsher punishment.

He said: "The attack on Michael Chapman which led to his death was, I have no doubts, pre-planned.

"You went up to those dark woods and you approached him in the dark from behind, thereby giving him no chance to defend himself.

"You were not manly enough to challenge him to a fair fight."

He added that the reasons Cowie had given for attacking Michael were "monumentally trivial".

During the trial in April, a jury heard how Cowie and a friend had been waiting for Michael as he walked home across a cricket ground.

Alan Kent, prosecuting, told the court: "Cowie ran up behind Michael and without saying a word punched him and knocked him to the ground. He was unaware, he didn't have a chance to defend himself and went straight to ground.

"Once on the ground Lee Cowie kicked him in the head, in his own words, 'As hard as I could'.

"Michael fell unconscious rapidly and died almost straight away."

An autopsy showed he died from a ruptured artery in his head.

After the attack Cowie ran to a friend's house, took off his Chelsea football shirt and went into town with three other boys to buy a kebab.