A knife crime campaigner whose son was stabbed to death says widespread protests and disorder sparked by the fatal Southport attack meant the victims had been “forgotten about”.

Violent disorder has been seen across England since the attack in the Merseyside town on 29 July that left three girls dead and 10 others seriously injured.

Zoe Cooke, whose son Byron Griffin was murdered in Derbyshire in 2021, said she had planned to attend one such protest in Nottingham on Saturday to show solidarity – until she realised it had attracted some far-right troublemakers.

Ms Cooke said the violence “took away” from the victims.

She wanted to show support to those affected by the Southport attack and advertised the event on her Facebook page, where she aims to raise awareness about knife crime.

But the campaigner says she took it down shortly after, when she was made aware the demonstration could attract far-right groups.

“It made me feel sad, really,” she added. “Because the way I look at it is, these three poor girls have lost their lives, and their family are grieving at the moment terribly. And people abuse this and use their pain for other things, basically for racism.”

Seven-year-old Elsie Dot Stancombe, nine-year-old Alice Dasilva Aguiar and six-year-old Bebe King were killed in the attack during a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, and eight other children and two adults were seriously injured.

False claims emerged online that the person responsible was an asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK by boat and a Muslim.

Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, from Banks in Lancashire, has been charged with three counts of murder, 10 counts of attempted murder and possession of a curved kitchen knife.

The 17-year-old, who was born to Rwandan parents in Cardiff and moved to the Southport area in 2013, has no known links to Islam.

Violence erupted in Southport on 30 July, with police blaming far-right groups, and it has since spread to other towns and cities across England.

Nottingham city centre saw hundreds of people gathering near the Brian Clough statue as part of the demonstrations.

A total of 15 people were arrested at the protest, which remained “largely peaceful”, police said.

“They’re using it as a way to be racist, and to a way to be horrible about religion,” Ms Cooke, from West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, added.

“People hide behind religion, behind different things, as a way to cause trouble and do different things. But it’s not the religion or the colour. It’s nothing to do with that.”

She said she watched videos on social media from the protest in Nottingham, adding: “I heard nothing said about the children that had died; there were no signs that I could see about people dying.

“All I could see from that was racism and using it as a way to cause trouble, or just to be there and make a scene, or to be nosy and jump on the bandwagon.

“Nothing good came out of it. The police time, the police money, and their resources were all used on that protest when these police resources could be used better elsewhere.”

In 2022, four men, originally from Derbyshire, were jailed for her son’s murder – each receiving life sentences and minimum terms to serve before parole – after a trial.

Ms Cooke, who has built a legacy around knife crime prevention in her son’s memory, says time does not take away from the pain of losing a child.

Not many days go by without her visiting Mr Griffin’s grave.

“[Protests] will not make the parents feel better,” she said. “Their children were killed by violence, and the protests ended up in violence.

“What [the parents] need now is people to remember their children.

“It’s the victims that we need to concentrate on.”