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Victim. Amanda Cummins |
Paranoid killer stabbed girlfriend
Judge warns knifeman who heard voices that he may never be released from mental unit
A PARANOID schizophrenic will be held in a mental unit indefinitely after admitting killing his girlfriend.
Darren John, 22, denied murdering Amanda Cummins, a youth project worker, but admitted manslaughter on grounds of diminished responsibility.
Judge Martin Stephens, QC, accepted Mr John’s plea on the grounds that he was suffering from paranoid delusions at the time of the stabbing.
During a half-hour hearing at the Old Bailey on Monday, an expert witness described how Mr John, of Peckwater estate in Kentish Town, had been hearing voices in his head that made him paranoid about his family and friends.
The judge ordered that he serve an indefinite sentence at Broadmoor Hospital in Berkshire, and warned that he may never be released.
Mr John leaned towards his family to give them the thumbs-up gesture as he was led away.
Ms Cummins’ body was discovered by a passer-by lying face down in the courtyard of College Place estate three days before Christmas 2005.
She was killed just minutes from the Camden Town home she shared with her grandmother.
Sallie Bennett-Jenkins, QC, prosecuting, said Mr John was arrested the day after her death and “simply replied ‘yes’”.
The prosecutor suggested that Mr John stabbed his “on-off” girlfriend of two years after she told him she planned to visit her ex-husband.
Ms Bennett-Jenkins said: “His girlfriend had indicated she would see her ex-husband. He had become infuriated and killed her.”
But the prosecutor admitted the reason for the killing may always remain a mystery.
“There were a number of texts and photographic images of a homosexual nature on John’s phone,” she told the court. “Maybe there had been a dispute which led him to kill her, but perhaps we will never know.”
Ms Cummins, 26, who was described by Ms Bennett-Jenkins as “kind” but “a little shy and naive”, often worked with children with special needs. Relatives wiped away tears during the hearing,
Her mother Angela used to run St Pancras Community Centre in Camden Street, Camden Town.
Recounting the minutes leading up to Ms Cummins’ death, Ms Bennett-Jenkins described how the pair had met for a drink about 9pm.
Ms Cummins, also known by the surname Bentsi-Addison, had expected Mr John to stay over and had texted him to ask what he wanted for breakfast.
CCTV footage of the couple at a newsagents soon after meeting was later used by detectives to identify what Mr John had been wearing that night.
Less than half an hour after meeting him, a badly-injured Ms Cummins was discovered in the estate courtyard. She died an hour later at University College Hospital in Euston.
Ms Bennett-Jenkins said: “It is plain that whatever took place between them happened in a very short space of time.”
Psychiatrist Tim McInerney, from Broadmoor Hospital, said Mr John “has impressed all clinicians as to the genuine nature of his illness”.
It was revealed that Mr John had been expelled from school at 14 for violent behaviour and went on to study at a school for teenagers with behavioural problems in Agincourt Road, Hampstead. The court heard he had been arrested for carrying a home-made knife – similar to the one used to stab Ms Cummins – just weeks before her death.
Judge Stephens told him: “You carried out a savage attack with a knife on a blameless, innocent lady, thereby causing her death and bringing untold grief to her family and friends.
“No one could fail to be moved on reading the statement of the victim’s mother. It’s quite clear the impact on the family has been utterly devastating and in the light of the deceased’s character it’s quite understandable why that should be.” |
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