Sam Willis, led by Catherine Pattison, prosecuted this murder where the defendant was relying on the partial defence of diminished responsibility. The defendant accepted that he had killed his sister-in-law by brutally attacking her with a hatchet, but claimed that he had been suffering from paranoid delusions at the time that caused him to see her as a manifestation of the devil. The prosecution’s case was that this ’sham defence’ had been concocted by the defendant after his arrest to avoid the consequences of his actions. Following a three-week trial the defendant’s account was rejected by the jury and they convicted him of murder and making a threat to kill. Complexities included contested opinion evidence from four psychiatrists and the admissibility of the defendant’s previous conviction in Moldova for the unlawful killing of his ex-wife.
Sam was instructed by CPS Homicide.
https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/ferocious-killer-murdered-sister-law-8621385
https://news.met.police.uk/news/man-convicted-of-the-murder-of-svetlana-mihalachi-in-ilford-470047
