Teenage girls who tortured 16-year-old and filmed it on Snapchat jailed

Guilty: Chyane Stephenson-Dielhenn, 18, before sentencing
Alex Lentati
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Two teenage girls held a 16-year-old girl hostage and tortured her at a London care home in a “humiliating” ordeal that was broadcast on Snapchat.

Chyane Stephenson-Dielhenn, 18, and her 16-year-old accomplice forced their victim to snort a salt and tea bag mixture, swallow her own vomit and eat noodles soaked in urine from a bowl on the floor. They tied the girl up, punched her and said that if she tried to escape they would kill her and her family.

The victim was taken prisoner in a 24-hour supported living facility in Barking and Dagenham on March 4, Snaresbrook crown court heard.

Jurors were shown clips, some filmed by Stephenson-Dielhenn, of the “cruel and sickening attack”. Instead of raising the alarm, recipients of the Snapchat videos sent suggestions about what the girls should do to their victim next.

Prosecutor James Thacker said: “This was nothing other than a wicked and despicable attack over a period of up to 10 hours. The victim was assaulted and detained against her will and told if she left then her life and the lives of her family would be in danger. Some of the degradation was filmed on a phone.”

He said the victim escaped when Stephenson-Dielhenn ordered her to take a shower and she ran to reception. “She was seen by [a member of staff] who had never seen anything like what he saw that day,” he said. “The victim was extremely frightened and sought refuge under a desk in the office.”

The 16-year-old, who cannot be named, admitted false imprisonment and assault in July. The court heard she had eight previous convictions for crimes including criminal damage, battery, robbery and theft.

This was Stephenson-Dielhenn’s first offence. She denied the charges but was found guilty of false imprisonment and assault occasioning actual bodily harm following a five-day trial last month.

Defence barrister Stephen Donnelly said she was “remorseful”.

Sentencing the pair yesterday, Recorder Shaun Murphy said: “The victim is scarred mentally and physically and this has caused her nightmares that still continue.”

Stephenson-Dielhenn, from Islington, was sentenced to three years in a young offender institution. Her co-defendant, of Tower Hamlets, received a two-and-a-half-year sentence.

Elaine Cousins, from the Crown Prosecution Service, said: “This was an unprovoked, cruel and sickening attack on an innocent young girl. The behaviour displayed was sadistic.

“Stephenson-Dielhenn and her co-defendant egged each other on and took pleasure in controlling, humiliating and degrading the young victim.

A spokesman for the supported living facility, which is council-funded but managed by an outside provider, said a “thorough” investigation had concluded that staff “acted appropriately and followed procedures once we became aware of the incident”.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT