A teenage murderer from Stevenage who along with four others stabbed a 17-year-old to death was yesterday jailed for life.

Stevenage 17-year-old Tyler Ralph will serve a minimum of 16 years behind bars after being found guilty of murdering Gillingham’s Kyle Yule – who died in hospital after Ralph and four others stabbed him five times on his friend’s doorstep.

Judge Adele Williams lifted reporting restrictions after the trial to allow the identification of Ralph and three others under the age of 18 who were found guilty of killing Kyle.

She told the court how the five defendants all regularly carried knives, and how videos of Ralph found on his phone showed him with a “fearsome array of knives and weapons”.

After the trial at Maidstone Crown Court, Kyle’s mother Nikki said: “His death has broken my heart and my children are broken without their big brother.

“Aside from losing Kyle, attending this trial is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to experience. I’ve had to listen to the awful detail of what they all did to my boy.”

Ralph was convicted alongside 19-year-old Victor Maibvisira from Gillingham, 17-year-old Ephrain Akinwunmi-Streets from Sittingbourne, 17-year-old Shezakia Daley from Gillingham and 16-year-old Jordan Dania from Croydon.

During the nine-week trial, witnesses told how trouble started between the group and Kyle’s friends when a bicycle was stolen, and Maibvisira threatened a young boy he believed to be responsible. Kyle and his friends tried to protect the boy.

From August onwards, the group repeatedly tried to assault Kyle and others with knives and other weapons. This culminated on the evening of Friday, October 6, when they surrounded a silver Renault Clio in which Kyle was sitting by himself.

They smashed the windows and slashed one of the tyres. Kyle got out of the car and ran to a friend’s home nearby, where he banged on the front door to try to get in – but before he could get to safety, the attackers stabbed him five times.

One stab wound, in his right armpit, caused an arterial bleed. Kyle died in hospital.

DCI Ivan Beasley, who was the senior investigating officer in the case, said that throughout the trial Ralph and the other killers had admitted being present but denied being involved in the attack that took Kyle’s life.

“The jury rightly saw through these lies,” said DCI Beasley.

Incidents for which Ralph had previous convictions included his slashing of a man’s head with a knife in broad daylight at a McDonald’s in south-east London, just six months before Kyle’s death.