High Court backs family's acquittal challenge

A High Court judge has granted the family of a man who was stabbed to death in a nightclub permission to challenge the Director of Public Prosecutions' decision not to apply to the Court of Appeal to overturn the acquittal of a man in connection with the killing.

Ryan Passey, 24, died from a single stab wound at Chicago's nightclub in Stourbridge on 6 August 2017. The man tried for murder was cleared by a jury in 2018. A subsequent civil case ruled that Passey had been unlawfully killed.

The judicial review was brought by the group Justice for Ryan and heard in Birmingham on Tuesday. They campaigned for a fresh examination of the case.

Emotions ran high in court, with tears visible in the public gallery after the judge granted a full hearing.

Passey's family were told in June that new evidence submitted by police to prosecutors in 2025 was not enough to bring charges, but further evidence had been found and was reviewed by the CPS in August.

At the murder trial in 2018, the accused, Kobe Murray, admitted stabbing Passey but said he had "pushed out" in defence during an altercation, not intending to pierce Passey with the knife he held.

A jury at Birmingham Crown Court acquitted him of murder and manslaughter, but Passey's family later won a civil case against Murray in 2021 after successfully arguing Passey had been unlawfully killed.

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