Wannabe gangster who shot teenage girl in the head while dancing with a gun in his hand is jailed for eight years

A wannabe gangster who shot a teenage girl in the head while dancing around with a gun was jailed for eight years today.

Wayne Bryan, 20, said by police to be fascinated by guns and gangs, had been drinking and smoking cannabis but thought it was 'cool' to dance with the weapon which accidentally went off in his hand.

Sophie Finucane, 16, who was enjoying a sleepover party with girlfriends at her house, was shot at close range in the head.

Bryan had been invited as they were friends, Manchester Crown Court heard.

Sophie, who had been 'excited' after buying a new dress to attend a school prom, was given just 40 minutes to live after bullet fragments lodged in her brain.

Miraculously Sophie, living with her mother in Manchester at the time, regained consciousness after 10 days in intensive care.

Her father, John, kept a bedside vigil, and is now looking after Sophie at his home in County Cork, Ireland.

Sophie is still unable to walk, has lost use in her right arm, her vision is damaged and she suffers seizures. She will never make a full recovery.

Just three days before the shooting police raided the Gorton home of Bryan, who had a long criminal record, and found a magazine with seven bullets. He was bailed by police.

Today officers denied this was a mistake and branded Bryan a 'coward' for getting rid of the gun before handing himself in an hour after the shooting, around 5.30am on June 14.

The weapon has never been found and police warned someone will die because it is still on the streets.

Unemployed Bryan admitted reckless wounding, possession of a firearm, possession of an imitation firearm and two counts of possession of ammunition at an earlier hearing at Manchester Crown Court.





Jailing him for eight years, Judge Andrew Gilbart QC said: 'This is a sad, tragic, terrible case.

'Guns are a scourge in parts of Manchester. Their possession is seen as something to be expected or proud of. They are neither.'

He quoted from a statement given to police by Sophie's father.

It said: 'I feel sad my only child will miss out on the three fundamental things in life; work, marriage and children.

'But that said, thank the Lord she is with us today.'

The prosecution accepted Bryan did not intend to shoot Sophie and had found the gun in the house.

But the court heard Bryan had been in and out of the courts for violent assaults and burglary, but had repeatedly been given non-custodial sentences.

A picture found by police on his mobile phone shows him posing with a revolver, and another with the words West Gorton Crew - a Manchester street-gang Bryan associated with.

He had also repeatedly been picked up by police and found to be wearing body armour - which he had tested by firing at with a Webley handgun.

On the night Sophie was shot, Bryan told police he found the gun in a bag at her house during the sleepover party.

'He took it out and began to dance around with it,' Adrian Farrow, prosecuting, told the court.

'He was drunk... and also smoking cannabis all day. He was waving his arms around.

'He described the feeling of holding the gun as being, "good" because it was a gun.'

Sophie was blasted in the left side of the head. Fragments of bullets are still in her brain and cannot be removed.

Bryan fled with the gun and bullets before going back to the scene with his mother to hand himself in.

Outside court Andy Tattersall, senior investigating officer for Greater Manchester Police branded Bryan a 'coward' for getting rid of the gun before helping his stricken friend.

'I personally think he should have got a longer sentence, but the courts are restricted by rules that govern sentencing.

'Wayne Bryan is a young man fascinated with gun and gang culture.

'What was his first reaction when he shot Sophie? His first reaction was not to help Sophie, it was to gather the gun and gather the bullets and run. continues here

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