Good Morning Britain’s Alex Beresford gave an emotional interview about his cousin’s death from stabbing as he returned to the show on Wednesday.
The weather presenter’s relative, Nathaniel Armstrong, was killed just days after Alex interjected in a live TV debate on knife crime earlier this month.
He explained his cousin was “not in a gang” and “went to a good school”, and said his death last Friday proved knife crime “can happen to anybody”.
Speaking to hosts Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid, Alex said the past few days has been “an emotional rollercoaster”.
“We also buried our uncle yesterday so it’s been a lot of ups and downs,” he said. “No one would have expected it, especially after I spoke out. You couldn’t make it up.
“It’s come as a big surprise that it’s happened to Nathaniel…he is 29, not in a gang, he went to a good school, university…”
On the unfortunate irony that this crime happened just days after Alex spoke out about knife crime on GMB, Alex continued: “It literally can happen to anybody. That’s why I was saying on the show, it is about environment and not just one environment, it’s about changing everything.
“Poverty, we have not solved that, this is why a lot of people are finding themselves in these situations…something just needs to be done.
“I can’t always find the words right now…I think this happening only reaffirms what I was saying about the environment and also about prisons and that they are not always a deterrent.”
He continued: “There are some people that will be deterred by a bigger (prison) sentence but for lots of boys that are committing these crimes, they don’t care.
“If you are prepared to pick up a knife and stab someone, or risk your own life, you are prepared to give your life, it’s not a deterrent.”
Asked about what happened when Nathaniel was killed, he said: “The person, we can’t find him at the moment. Nathaniel is not here to tell his side of the story.
“We have seen the CCTV where they are talking … They disappear off camera and what happened, happened. As I understand it, it was a single stab wound that took his life.”
Nathaniel was stabbed around 100 metres from his Fulham home in the early hours of the morning, amid reports of a fight.
He died in Gowan Avenue shortly before 1am – the same street where TV presenter Jill Dando was murdered 20 years ago.
With Nathaniel’s killer still at large, Alex added: “We need to think about the other side of this. This person who has done this to my cousin, he has also ruined his life, the ripple effect goes wider, it affects his family as well and that’d why we need to fix this problem from both sides.
“That’s why I have said before: ‘Nobody wins, everybody loses in these situations’”.
Good Morning Britain airs weekdays at 6am on ITV.