Express reporter Adam Toms has spoken with mothers living a ghostly existence.

A hidden scandal is unfolding under the Mayor of London’s watch (Image: Getty)

“I’m numb; my emotions have been totally turned off,” Karen Michelle McPhillips tells me at Haverstock School on a chilly early winter day in north west London. The 62-year-old pub landlady is just one of a host of mothers in the capital who are living a ghostly existence following the brutal deaths of their children. Jonathan McPhillips was stabbed in 2017 in Upper Street, Islington, while protecting a friend from blade-wielding attackers, his family say.

Everyday, Ms McPhillips resorts to praying to God as she says no contact from the Metropolitan Police has been forthcoming since an inquest into her son’s death in 2019. She believes that people will keep being slain in the city until someone in the Government experiences the same loss as her. “I’d like to see them actually be injected with how I feel every single day of my life,” the mum said pointedly.

Karen Michelle McPhillips’s son Jonathan was stabbed and later died (Image: Philip Coburn/Daily Express)

Kim Williams has endured a longer wait for someone to be punished over the violent death of her son, Karl Hamilton, 17, in 2004.

He was wounded on his head, torso, and left thigh after being attacked by, it is believed, a group of around 15 individuals.

For 21 years, Ms Williams has waited for someone to be held responsible, not giving in, and today continuing to try and force change with total drive and passion.

A physically diminutive figure who walks with the aid of a walking stick, she could be easily underestimated. But those in power would do so at their peril.

I have met with her on a couple of occasions now, and watched her let rip wearing a T-shirt bearing a large, unmistakable photo of her son’s face.

It’s quite a sight.

The bereaved mum claimed she does not receive updates from the police, and thinks that officers have been passed a statement from a man who named himself and two others as perpetrators.

The Express understands that the Hamilton case is active and enquiries are ongoing.

Kim told me that it has been reopened twice, and only after contacting the police.

On Tuesday, the women met Reform UK London Assembly Member Alex Wilson at City Hall.

They and other members of the Binning Knives Saves Lives group told him about their quest to install emergency blood kits in as many places as possible, which they say are crucial to saving lives.

Bereaved mother Kim Williams attending a meeting at City Hall (Image: Adam Gerrard / Daily Express)

They contain tourniquets, haemostatic gauze and chest seals, which are designed to stop catastrophic bleeding in the event of a knifing.

The campaigners currently pay for the kits out of their own pockets, including tax, and would like to receive some funding.

Sue Hedges, the mother of Ricky Hayden, 27, who was stabbed to death with a machete outside his home in 2016, said: “My bank account is dry now.”

They can be placed inside buildings, such as railway stations and schools, or attached to the outside in a cabinet.

But these are expensive.

The group also purport that residents living near where they would like to keep a kit – which is registered on a national database – worry that it would affect local house prices.

The Express understands that the Met supports the charities and local partners distributing blood kits, even though their effectiveness has not been tested.

Michelle raised her wait for justice at the meeting, saying: “We need to have that support.

“That ongoing non-support is the big problem. It’s a massive, massive problem.”

She added: “What you’re doing by not catching them is empowering them.”

A specialist unit should be set up whose sole function is to crack unsolved cases, Ms McPhillips suggested.

Yzakia Jauad has still not had justice delivered for her son, Claudyo Jauad, who was fatally stabbed aged 17 on Granville Road in Brent in 2023.

This is despite the offer of a £20,000 reward.

Yzakia Jauad campaigns with Courtney Barrett, the founder of ‘Binning Knives Saves Lives’ (Image: Philip Coburn/Daily Express)

She told me that people who may have information have been reluctant to speak out, and she was told that there are too many evidential “gaps” to secure a conviction over Claudyo’s killing.

Ms Jauad believes that she knows who is responsible for his death.

She said: “I know where they are, but unfortunately the system requires evidence, very, like, proper evidence.”

The mother added: “It’s knowing that I could walk in the shop and they’re there.

“They can do this to somebody else’s child… it’s painful.”

Former Scotland Yard detective John Wedger, who retired in 2017, told me that “justice delayed is justice denied”.

“This should be a priority,” he added.

“The justice system should be swift on this, but it’s everything but.

“They’ve downgraded every single bit of policing.”

On why these cases were not being solved, Mr Wedger said: “I would have thought resources would be the main thing, without a doubt.

“What we’ve got to look at is knife crime is a crime of violence. Violence is anger, violence is trauma.

“They’re all interlinked. There’s a bigger socioeconomic problem going on here.”

Michelle thinks the same as John.

She said during the meeting that “poverty is the be all and end all”.

Mr Wedger has “never understood” the logic of putting knife bins at police stations, as those with blades would not want to go near the law enforcement bases.

Incidentally, cuts means London will be left with just two stations with front counters operating 24/7, as 10 more are set to shut.

Mr Wilson said: “It was truly eye-opening to meet the mothers of those who lost their sons to knife crime.

Binning Knives Saves Lives representatives met with Alex Wilson (Image: Adam Gerrard / Daily Express)

Former Met detective Jon Wedger says a lack of resources contributes towards unsolved cases (Image: Adam Gerrard / Daily Express)

“As Leader of the Reform Group on the London Assembly, I will continue to use my platform to campaign tirelessly so that more mothers don’t have to bury their children after losing them in such horrendous circumstances.

“More than ever, I am convinced that – as well as robust enforcement of our laws – bleed kits will save hundreds of lives if they are readily available after the unthinkable happens.

“As defibrillators are, I believe that they should be kept in most public places in London. I’m determined to be part of the campaign to make that happen.”

Sir Sadiq Khan, who is London’s police and crime comissioner as well as its mayor, talks about tackling the “causes of crime”, and treating it like an “infection”.

Mr Wedger is encouraged by this.

He said: “It’s always to right address the cause of crime.”

The former detective then emphasised that a large percentage of the UK’s prison population experienced abusive childhoods.

“There is no incentive and there is no funding and there is hardly any experience in this level of policing,” Mr Wedger added.

“When I was there, it was the most under financed, understaffed and overworked [section].”

The Met and Sir Sadiq are highlighting that the amount of “knife-enabled crime” has fallen by 16% in the past year, while homicide in Greater London is at a 10-year low.

Met Police data states that the force recorded 906 knife crime offences in the capital in May 2016, when Sir Sadiq was first elected.

In October this year, there were 1,202.

Regardless of the data, horrific violence and its legacy continues to dominate the lives of Londoners.

Each brutal death is an explosion, whose shrapnel shreds through those who knew the victim.

Not having justice for their loved one is a life sentence of its own.

Lord knows that solving cases and serving justice costs money.

If one considers that the Met has identified a £20million budget gap in 2026-27 – alongside a widely publicised backlog of criminal cases going to court in the UK – relatives like those I have spoken with seem to be in for an even longer wait for at least some degree of peace.