Girl aged 13 locked up for stabbing adoptive mother and attacking three care workers
A 13-year-old girl has been locked up for 18 months for stabbing her adoptive mother.
She was aged 12 when she plunged a kitchen knife into her 47-year-old mother’s arm at the family home in Wimbledon, south-west London, on March 2.
She went on to attack three care workers with a knife she had borrowed on the pretext of peeling grapes in September, the Old Bailey (pictured) heard.
The girl had denied attempting to murder her mother but admitted the lesser offence of wounding with intent during an earlier hearing.
She had pleaded guilty to wounding with intent, making threats to kill, and two charges of attempted wounding with intent in relation to the attack on care workers.
On Friday, the girl sat in the well of the court as Judge Judy Khan KC sentenced her to 18 months in custody.
Judge Khan told her: “I very much hope that you will get the support you need and you will be able to learn from your past mistakes.
“You are very young and there is every reason you can turn your life around and be happy and successful in the future.”
The judge explained her decision to hand the girl a custodial sentence saying that she had taken into account her young age, welfare and rehabilitation.
But she also considered the girl did pose a “high risk of harm to others” in the future.
She told the defendant: “There is a need to protect the public and protect you from harming yourself.”
Earlier, prosecutor James Thacker KC set out the facts of the case, saying the the defendant’s behaviour had becoming “increasingly concerning” before the attack on her mother.
It had prompted her parents and teachers to remove sharp utensils such as knives from where she could get hold of them.
The defendant was excluded from school as teachers were “frightened” of her, Mr Thacker said.
On the day of the stabbing, the defendant was at home with her mother and younger brother when she became increasingly “agitated and aggressive”.
She came downstairs to the kitchen, threatened her mother and produced a long grey-handled kitchen knife.
Mr Thacker said: “(The girl) gestured towards her mother while walking around the ground floor.
“(Her mother) tried to close the door dividing the hallway from the kitchen but (the girl) leaned through the gap in the door and made slashing movements towards her mother.”
The court heard that during a struggle over the knife, the mother’s arm was struck and she realised she had been stabbed.
The defendant screamed and panicked, saying voices had told her to do it, the court was told.
An ambulance was called at 7.13pm and police also attended the address and spoke to the girl before she and her mother were taken separately to St George’s Hospital in Tooting.
The mother was treated in hospital for her injury which was not thought to be life-threatening.
The defendant was not detained under the Mental Health Act before she was arrested and interviewed by police.
She told officers that she had meant to kill her mother as part of a plan to also kill herself.
She warned that if she was released and sent home she would kill those in the house, Mr Thacker said.
He said: “(The girl) offered no apologies and showed no remorse for what she had done and said that she was crying tears of joy when she stabbed her mother as she believed she may have killed her.”
The court was told that psychiatric reports had been prepared about the defendant’s mental state, although details were not given.
Following the attack on her mother, the defendant was remanded into the care of the local authority on March 19 under the proviso she be accompanied by three support workers 24 hours a day.
At about 9pm on September 2, she asked her care workers for a knife to cut grapes and then refused to hand the 10cm blade back.
She became increasingly agitated and continued to refuse to give up the knife and threatened to stab one of the staff members.
Police were called after the defendant threatened and chased two female care workers around the living room, forcing them to pick up chairs to protect themselves and barricade themselves into a hallway.
Mr Thacker said: “The shouting and threats can be heard on the call to the emergency services and how terrified the staff were.”
When police arrived at 1am, the defendant was in the kitchen still holding the knife in a “clenched fist” and making “small stabbing actions”, the court was told.
Police asked her “calmly and politely” to put the knife down so they could help resolve the problem, but she refused saying: “I want to stab them, I’m going to stab them.”
Mr Thacker said officers had no other choice than to conduct a “red dot challenge” with a taser to get the girl to drop the blade before she was arrested and handcuffed.
Asked if she had anything harmful, she disclosed she had a drinks ring pull in her pocket which was disposed of.
Mr Thacker said the staff said they were “very shaken” by what happened and that “they genuinely feared for their lives during it”.
The girl told police that she had taken the knife to self harm, claiming she was hearing voices and hallucinating and that she had issues with social workers and the care system.
Mr Thacker said: “She expressed surprise that the social workers supported the prosecution as they said they would not call the police.
“(She) said she knew her behaviour would cause the victims to have issues but that they would have known the risks of their job and that they should have provided her support to prevent this happening.”
The girl was flanked by three care workers and four security guards were deployed in court for the hearing.
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