How 15-year-old who rampaged school with a butcher’s knife and screamed ‘I’m going to kill you’ grew up to become Spanian – the YouTube star with three kids to multiple women
On Tuesday, December 11, 2001, a 15-year-old schoolboy ran amok with a butcher’s knife at Dover Heights High School in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.
The deranged student stormed into a class and held an 18cm blade to the throat of another boy, then went from classroom to classroom.
Momentarily restrained by a teacher, he broke free and later picked up a softball bat and chased kids while screaming: ‘I’m going to kill you.’
The male student, identified in media reports at the time only as AL, had a history of violent behaviour dating back to primary school.
His real name was Anthony Lees, who years later would gain global fame as the convicted criminal and YouTube sensation known as Spanian .
Lees had only started at 600-student Dover Heights High in October after he was expelled from another school – but had already clocked up a series of incidents there.
Just the day before, on December 10, Lees and another boy appeared to be drunk and teachers confiscated a bottle of alcohol but Lees became aggressive, hurt himself and had to be restrained.
Police and ambulance attended, taking Lees to hospital where officers interviewed him before his release.
Lees returned the next day, behaving aggressively and refusing requests to leave, before brandishing the knife.
Spanian as the young crim Anthony Lees, who went into the juvenile justice system after running amok with a butcher’s knife at the Dover Heights High School in 2001
Spanian pictured on Melbourne Cup Day at Sydney’s Barangaroo, close to his $6 million waterfront apartment following his split from wife Angela McColl
Anthony Lees, known as ‘Spanian’ online, has introduced his much younger girlfriend (pictured together) after the end of his two-year marriage
He ran with the knife through the school to the lower playground, where two teachers were supervising students playing softball.
Confronted by Lees screaming threats and brandishing the knife, they were forced to flee for their lives over a wire fence as he picked up a softball bat and chased them.
Further harm was averted only when nearby building workers came to the rescue, restraining Lees, who police arrested and charged with assault and being armed with intent to cause harm.
The next day he appeared in Bidura Children’s Court, where he did not enter a plea or apply for bail, and was remanded in custody until January the following year.
Lees, better known these days as Spanian, was about to begin his life of crime.
Even at that young age, the future rapper was already exerting significant influence.
Following Lees’s rampage, one Dover Heights staff member suffered a hernia, while others later reported PTSD, anxiety and depression.
The NSW Teachers’ Federation successfully sued the Department of Education and won a record $220,000 payment, which led to a radical overhaul of the way in which students are enrolled in NSW public schools.
An Industrial Relations Commission judge ruled ‘the school was not told about [Lees’] violent history before he endangered staff and other pupils during a series of violent incidents over two days’.
Spanian then became a drug dealer and a thief, stealing laptops and running a major operation selling cocaine and heroin
Spanian was Anthony Lees, the deranged student who stormed into a class and held an 18cm blade to the throat of another boy, then went from classroom to classroom
In 2006, Justice Tricia Kavanagh awarded the highest-ever penalty imposed for an occupational health and safety breach of its type in a school.
Spanian’s actions led to a change in policy requiring school principals to be informed of any history of violence, psychiatric illness, or disciplinary records prior to student enrolment.
Lees was incarcerated at Cobham Youth Justice Centre in Werrington, western Sydney.
This was merely the first of several sentences served by the teenage Spanian over three years, during which he gained the nickname due to his dark looks and his father’s Spanish heritage.
He says the juvenile detention shaped his immediate future and after the Dover Heights rampage, he never returned to school after being released.
Spanian told the I Catch Killers podcast that he grew up in Dulwich Hill and Marrickville, in Sydney’s inner west with his mother, after his father left for Queensland when he was born ‘to start a new family’.
He began pulling knives on people aged 10 or 11.
‘The first time I stabbed someone in the yard at school I was trying to impress some girls,’ he said.
Spanian said that he began pulling knives on people aged 10 or 11: ‘The first time I stabbed someone in the yard at school I was trying to impress some girls’
Spanian and his now-estranged wife, Angela McColl, who have a five-month-old baby son together
Spanian’s latest transformation – and the public debut of a much younger girlfriend, Ava (above) – has loyal fans questioning his authenticity
‘I was a criminal because I wanted to be. I loved it. I thought being bad was cool.’
Spanian said the school incident was sparked when he was suspended for stealing a phone, and he returned with a kitchen knife to find whoever had reported him.
He became a heroin addict at the age of 16, and began stealing laptops from cars to support his habit, serving time for break-and-enters and a ram raid.
He said he was a member of an inner-city street gang, the Young Woollo Boys, based in Woolloomooloo, and has the name of the suburb tattooed across his chest in red.
‘I carried on stabbing people, always had a box cutter, meat cleaver, always looking for someone to stab,’ he said.
‘There is definitely something wrong with me, even now.’
Spanian graduated to adult prison, where inmates congregated into ethnic groups – Pacific Islander, Lebanese, Vietnamese, and Spanian joined the Aboriginal prisoners.
When he was released from jail in 2008, he stabbed someone ‘in the neck … the day I got out’.
He was soon back inside for the offences of inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent and reckless wounding, pleaded down from an attempted murder charge.
Spanian said that he was jailed yet again in 2001 after ‘I became a heroin and cocaine dealer with a very big drug run’
Out again in 2011, he became a ‘heroin and cocaine dealer with a very big drug run’ for ten months until he was caught and convicted for a drug operation that recruited children.
Spanian the ‘crimfluencer’ and hip-hop artist, was born after his final release from custody, when he walked out of Bathurst Correctional Centre in 2017 and vowed never to return to jail.
He said he had begun rapping in the jail yard, impressing another inmate-turned-rapper who contacted him when they were both out, telling Spanian he had a future on YouTube.
By late 2019, he was being recognised by fellow customers in KFC.
His ‘Into the Hood’ YouTube series gained a huge following through music and documentary-style vlogs filmed in tough suburbs, warning viewers against criminal lifestyles.
Spanian now has almost a million followers on Instagram, 1.2million YouTube subscribers and 765,000 followers on TikTok.
His fame has surged, and he is frequently stopped in public, with every aspect of his life scrutinised – from his nose job to his gleaming new teeth.
Yet Spanian’s recent transformation, including his much younger new girlfriend, has some loyal followers doubting his authenticity.
Many have asked online if he is now turning into just another Bondi-style influencer.
Just weeks ago, Spanian confirmed his split from wife Angela McColl, the mother of his five-month-old son, who has hinted at sharing her side of the story.
Spanian, now an entrepreneur with his own food line, Spanian’s Kebabs, has several companies and operates Spanian’s Kebabs food truck franchises worth more than $2.5million
Just weeks ago, Spanian confirmed his split from wife Angela McColl, the mother of his five-month-old son, who has hinted at sharing her side of the story
Spanian and McColl’s baby boy is the rapper’s third son, and he has since publicised his new relationship with 22-year-old Sydney woman Ava Jean Walker, posting a cosy Snapchat photo with the Harbour Bridge glittering behind them.
‘I’m in the news because I have a beautiful new missus,’ Spanian bragged online.
‘I get a girlfriend, I’m in the news. I break up with my ex-wife, I’m in the news. I love that I’m extremely relevant.’
Spanian said in another video he was ‘clearly separated’ from Angela and that it was a simple case of two people changing and ‘fall[ing] out of love’.
‘She thought it would be better if we separated and I lived here, and I did,’ he said.
Spanian is now an entrepreneur, running multiple businesses including his food line ‘Spanian’s Kebabs’, with truck franchises valued at over $2.5million
His rapidly growing kebab business is set to open its first store on King Street, Newtown, with others in development
He drives a flash $250,000 Mercedes G-Wagen, the luxury SUV favoured by Sydney businessmen such as King of the Cross John Ibrahim.
Last year he also bought his now-estranged wife a more modest white $150,000 Mercedes-AMG GLC43 SUV.
The boy who spent much of his adolescence in boys’ homes now lives in a $6 million waterfront Barangaroo apartment.
But while he boasts of his ‘extreme’ relevance, not everyone is cheering him on.
In May 2025, a Spanian’s Kebabs truck in Melbourne burned down in a suspected arson attack.
And while he was once praised for his gritty authenticity, fans now say Spanian has become ‘unrecognisable’ – both in looks and attitude.
‘He’s had the nose done, the veneers, and now he’s dating someone who looks so much younger,’ one fan commented on TikTok, a sentiment echoed across dozens of posts.
‘This isn’t the Spanian people followed. He’s let the fame and money go to his head.’
