Videos will highlight family's fight for justice for Ryan Passey

The Justice for Ryan campaign is launching a 10-day campaign within the coming days entitled The Story of My Boy which will tell the heart-wrenching story of how Ryan, aged 24, was stabbed to death in the old Chicago's nightclub on August 6, 2017, and how the ensuing trial ended with Dudley's Kobe Murray walking free from court after convincing the jury he had lashed out accidentally - even though he admitted he "stabbed out" with a knife during a disturbance in the club.

The videos tell how Ryan, who used to play for Stourbridge FC's youth team, never returned home that fateful night, which changed lives forever, and they include interviews with Ryan's devastated dad Adrian Passey.

He told the News: "Ryan didn't deserve to have his life taken away, he just went out on a normal night and never came back home to his Mom and Dad."

Heartbroken Adrian, aged 55, said he hopes the videos, created by PR and marketing company New Wave Media, show the public "what a lovely lad" Ryan was and "where we are going with our campaign which is never going to go away" and he stressed: "We're never going to give up, we're going to fight until the end - until we get justice for Ryan."

Family friend Jason Connon, spokesman for the Justice for Ryan campaign, said: "The filming has been extremely difficult, emotional and painful for Adrian and had the crew in tears listening to his harrowing story and how we were let down by our criminal justice system and have been forced to fight for our own justice ever since."

A short 10-minute video will be released each day on the campaign's social media channels - to mark the February 6 anniversary of the not guilty verdict given at Birmingham Crown Court in 2018 which saw murder accused Kobe Murray acquitted of both murder and manslaughter charges.

Ever since - Ryan's dad, along with mum Gill and step-dad Phil, have been campaigning for a law change to enable families affected by so-called perverse verdicts - where a jury has acquitted the accused contrary to the evidence given in court - and it is hoped the videos will help give the campaign profile a boost.

Mr Connon added: "We hope these short videos will help our fight to get changes made in our laws in regards to appealing perverse jury acquittal verdicts and our self-defence laws in regards to knife crime."

He said the films take a "warts and all" look at how Ryan's grieving family have been left feeling "eaten up by the criminal justice system, then just spat out, with with very little support offered afterwards" and he added: "We want to show the real impact on victim’s families and the flawed processes currently within our criminal system. More importantly we want to highlight the lasting and devastating impact knife crime has on families, friends and our communities.

"We want to help prevent any other family having to go through our life shattering experiences and we talk about what the government can do, what the police can do, what the criminal justice system can do to better support victims and their families.

"Finally, on the last day there is call to action – to join and support our fight for Justice For Ryan which highlights what people can do to help."

The films also introduce private investigators Russ Winfield and Simon Bates of Liberton Investigations whom the family have joined forces with to help further their campaign.

Adrian Passey, Jason Connon and investigator Russ Winfield

Mr Winfield, a former Detective Superintendent with the Met Police, said: "Clearly Ryan's family have not had justice as they see it through the criminal justice system. It's only right that we try and get to the justice they deserve."

He said the 10-day campaign aims to highlight "just what a nightmare this journey has been for the family and to try and help prevent any other family going through what they've gone through".