Murder

Police are asking for the community’s assistance after a man was found horrifically murdered. Image: Pixabay

Knife attacker sentenced to indefinite psychiatric detention

Valdo Calocane has been sentenced to indefinite detention at a psychiatric hospital following a random knife attack in Nottingham.

Murder

Police are asking for the community’s assistance after a man was found horrifically murdered. Image: Pixabay

A 32-year-old man who killed three people during a random knife attack in Nottingham, central England, was on Thursday sentenced to indefinite detention at a psychiatric hospital.

Valdo Calocane stabbed to death two 19-year-old students and a 65-year-old school caretaker during the attacks in June last year that resulted in police locking down the entire city.

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Calocane

Prosecutors earlier this week accepted Calocane’s plea of guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Judge Mark Turner, handing down the sentence, said Calocane would “very probably” be detained in a high-security hospital for the rest of his life.

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“Your sickening crimes both shocked the nation and wrecked the lives of your surviving victims and the families of them all,” he told the killer.

Nottingham University students Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley-Kumar were stabbed near the city centre just after 4:00 am (0300 GMT) on June 13.

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Ian Coates, the caretaker, was found stabbed nearby shortly afterwards.

Calocane also ran over three other people, leaving one with critical injuries, after stealing a van belonging to Coates.

The attacks shocked Britain, and thousands of people attended vigils and memorial services for the victims in Nottingham.

schizophrenia

Calocane, who has paranoid schizophrenia, had previously been detained in hospital four times under mental health laws. He was arrested in September 2021 for assaulting a police officer.

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The court heard that he had not been taking his prescribed medication for his mental illness during the time he committed his crimes.

Nottingham Police said this week that it “should have done more” to arrest Calocane before the attacks in the wake of the alleged police officer assault.

© Agence France-Presse