14 DAY TRIAL // A convicted murderer is set to become Britain's youngest ever grandfather at the age of just 27, after his 13-year-old daughter has fallen pregnant.
The jailed man is serving a life sentence for the fatal stabbing of a bystander who was trying to stop a street robbery. He was locked up at 16, when his daughter was just 2 years old.
Apparently, the man begged the girl not to have the child and get an abortion, but she posted a photograph of her scan on Facebook, announcing her friends that she was five months pregnant.
“I quite like the idea of being the youngest granddad in Britain, but at the same time I'm fuming that she is pregnant. I know myself how tough it is being a teenage parent and now she has to go through the same thing,” her father said, according to Yahoo News.
“It's quite mad. I'm about to be a grandad. I was 14 when my daughter was born, and now she's having a baby,” he added.
The identities of the incredibly young mother-to-be or the future grandfather were not disclosed for legal reasons, but she reportedly lives in a suburb of one of Britain's biggest cities, with her mother and two other children. It is said that she has been withdrawn from school and is now being taught at a special unit for pregnant teens.
As for the father of the child, reports say that the boy is her own age.
Although her family expressed its despair at the situation, the girl’s 28-year-old mother has promised to take responsibility for the baby, but declined to make any comment.
On the other hand, the girl's Facebook friends posted comments congratulating her for the baby and for defying her father.
“Hurry up and push that baby out. You and (...) are going to be the best mum and dad,” one pal wrote.
However, after the story of the 13-year-old's pregnancy spread across the media, people's reactions were mixed. Some expressed their support, while others criticized her for being irresponsible.
Britain's previous youngest granddad was Shem Davies, from Bridgend in South Wales, who was 29 when his 15-year-old daughter got pregnant.
Teenage pregnancy in the United Kingdom is a long-standing social phenomenon, and the country currently has the highest teenage birth rate in Western Europe. The number of teenage mothers is five times higher in UK than in the Netherlands and twice that of France and Spain.