Love Island UK Boots Casa Amor Contestant After Stabbing Court Documents Surface — But He Was Never Charged

Gabriel Garland, a 24-year-old Casa Amor entrant on ITV2’s Love Island UK Season 13, was removed from the show after producers discovered his name appeared in court documents linked to a 2019 stabbing in south-east London. According to court filings obtained by The Sun, Garland had an altercation with two individuals on New Year’s Eve 2019, after which his friend Vitor Mazzer stabbed both victims; Mazzer was subsequently convicted of two counts of grievous bodily harm with intent. Garland himself was never charged with a crime or found guilty of any wrongdoing [1].

An ITV spokesperson confirmed to Deadline that “Gabriel has now left the Villa and will not be returning.” The network stated that its standard background-check process failed to surface the incident specifically because Garland held no criminal conviction of his own. Garland appeared briefly in Sunday’s episode introducing the Casa Amor bombshells before being removed from the show entirely [1, 2].

Why It Sucks:

Love Island Fans and Viewers

• ITV’s vetting process let a red flag through unchecked. Fans watching a show that places contestants in an intimate shared villa argue a basic duty of care was breached: Garland’s alleged role in triggering the altercation that preceded a stabbing was documented in open court records, yet ITV’s screening process — which reportedly relies on conviction checks alone — never caught it [1, 2].
• Fellow contestants shared a villa not knowing his history. The other Love Island participants had no way of knowing about the 2019 incident, and many viewers contend they deserved the right to make informed decisions about who they were living in close quarters with [1].
• His broadcast introduction created a storyline that now has no resolution. Garland’s Casa Amor arrival was aired to audiences before his removal was confirmed — meaning viewers who began investing in his storyline now have a contestant-shaped void in a pivotal moment of the season [1, 2].

Gabriel Garland

• He was never charged, tried, or convicted of anything. The court documents name Garland only as someone who had an altercation before a third party committed the stabbing; he was not accused of stabbing anyone, was not charged by police, and was not found guilty of any offense — yet he has been publicly identified on a national platform as someone “involved in a stabbing incident” [1, 3].
• Being uncharged and being publicly penalized is a due process problem. The principle that uncharged individuals should not face consequences equivalent to convicted criminals is foundational to criminal justice norms; being removed from a nationally broadcast program because a convicted person’s court documents reference your name — without finding you culpable — sets a troubling precedent for anyone ever named in a third party’s legal proceedings [2, 3].
• ITV’s own vetting cleared him, then ejected him under media pressure anyway. ITV explicitly acknowledged that its standard screening found no disqualifying information because Garland had no convictions, yet removed him once press coverage surfaced — effectively punishing him for passing the broadcaster’s own established criteria [1, 2].

ITV and Reality TV Producers

• The conviction-only screening standard is now publicly exposed as insufficient. ITV’s admission that its background checks only flag criminal convictions — not court documents referencing uncharged individuals — has drawn sharp scrutiny from viewers and industry observers who argue that the broadcaster’s duty-of-care obligations to both contestants and audiences demand a more thorough process [1, 2].
• Expanding checks to court documents creates its own legal minefield. If ITV revises its protocols to screen for documents naming uncharged parties, the broadcaster risks running into the UK Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and UK GDPR restrictions on processing personal data about individuals who have never been found guilty of an offense — leaving producers with no clean solution in either direction [2].
• The incident revives long-running duty-of-care criticism of the franchise. Following the deaths of past Love Island contestants and years of public pressure over the show’s psychological safeguards, this episode reinforces arguments that ITV’s safeguarding measures have not kept pace with the very real personal and reputational risks to which contestants are exposed [1, 3].

Sources & Citations:

[1] Deadline: ‘Love Island UK’ Removes Casa Amor’s Gabriel Garland After Reported Involvement In Stabbing Incident
[2] Hollywood Reporter: Love Island U.K. Castmember Removed After Reported Link to Stabbing
[3] TMZ: ‘Love Island UK’ Pulls Contestant Gabriel Garland After Stabbing Case Connection