Christina Edkins: Memorial garden opens for bus stab victim
A garden in memory of a teenage girl who was stabbed to death on a bus in March has officially opened.
Christina Edkins, 16, from Birmingham, was attacked on the number nine bus at Five Ways in Edgbaston.
On Wednesday, Phillip Simelane was detained under the Mental Health Act after admitting her manslaughter.
The garden, opened by former England rugby player Phil Vickery, has been built at St Edmund's Catholic Primary in Spring Hill, Birmingham.
Christina, a former pupil of St Edmund's, was on her way to Leasowes High School in Halesowen to take an exam when she was killed by a single stab wound.
The head teacher of the high school, Neil Shaw, said if he had the chance to choose the sort of pupil he would like to teach, "[he] would fill the school with Christinas".
The rugby charity Wooden Spoon gave £8,000 of the £10,000 needed to build the garden in the grounds of the school in Roseberry Street.
The rest of the money was raised by school pupils and the police.
Mary O'Friel, head teacher of St Edmund's, said a special Mass had been held with her pupils in memory of Christina.
"Some of the children have older brothers or sisters who knew Christina, so it is very real to them," she said.