Murder accused recorded on phone as he stabbed and strangled girlfriend after eating cannabis brownie, court hears
A man accused of murdering his girlfriend was recorded on a mobile phone as he repeatedly stabbed, strangled, and ran over her during a psychotic episode after eating a cannabis brownie, a court has been told.
University student Lauren Bloomer, who was stabbed more than 30 times, “recorded her own murder” after seeking advice on the internet about the “bad weed trip” suffered by Jake Notman, Stafford Crown Court heard.
Notman, 27, denies murdering 25-year-old Miss Bloomer at their home in Bingley Avenue, Tamworth, in the early hours of 20 November last year, claiming he did not form the necessary intent due to his mental state.
Opening the case, prosecutor Deborah Gould told jurors that Miss Bloomer had activated her telephone to record what was happening “like something out of the movie Scream”.
Describing what could be seen or heard on the near-17-minute recording, Ms Gould told the court: “The audio captured the moments leading up to, including and after the murder.
“It shows the defendant as he began to attack Lauren Bloomer, at first with his bare hands.
“At the start of the recording you will hear her laughing and the defendant accusing her of laughing at him.”
The jury was told that Notman became aggressive nine minutes into the recording, around a minute before Lauren is heard saying ‘please help me’ to his aunt in a call on a second phone.
The Crown’s barrister added: “You may think when you hear the sounds that the defendant is downstairs, the phone remaining upstairs.
“At 10 minutes and 49 seconds in the recording, Lauren stops screaming. The defendant is then heard shouting ‘I will never f****** see you again’.”
Police at the scene in Bingley Avenue, Tamworth, in November last year. Pic: Adam Hughes/SWNS
Notman, the court was told, was then heard saying “I am going to make sure”, before the sound of a revving engine is heard.
A thud was then recorded by the victim’s phone, which the Crown says was the sound of Notman’s Ford Kuga being driven over Miss Bloomer.
The defendant, who worked for Jaguar Land Rover at its Solihull site, was seen by neighbours as he ran over his partner’s body, and took no steps to help her before heading back into their house, it is alleged.
He is then said to have dialled 999 at 1.32am, telling the operator he had “been told I have killed my girlfriend”.
Notman had made no comment in five police interviews, instead providing a statement suggesting the cannabis brownie – the first he had ever consumed – had something in it other than cannabis, Ms Gould said.
Telling the court three psychiatrists had assessed Notman’s “disordered” behaviour, Ms Gould said it was believed he had suffered an adverse reaction.
But she told the jury: “It does not provide a defence in law.”
“A disordered intention caused by self-induced ingestion of an intoxicant is as good as a sober intention.
“You can infer that the defendant intended to kill Lauren or cause her really serious injury from the fact that he beat her, tried to strangle her… and sought out a knife and used it to attack Lauren for a second time.
“You can infer it from what he said before he drove the car over her.”
The psychiatrists in the case agree Notman was experiencing a psychotic episode, the jury heard.
Defence barrister Andrew Fisher QC also made a brief address to the jury at the start of the trial, saying Notman had suffered an “extreme florid psychiatric episode in the course of which he totally lost touch with reality and became wholly delusional”.
The trial continues.
UK
Channel migrant dinghy in which five people died packed with people carrying weapons and fighting – survivor
The migrant dinghy in which five people died was chaotic, overloaded and packed with people carrying weapons and fighting, according to one of the passengers who was on board, speaking exclusively to Sky News.
Heivin, 18, confirmed the boat was stormed by a rival group of migrants, armed with sticks and knives, as it was preparing to set off.
She said: “People were fighting, people were getting stepped on, they were dying and being thrown off.”
She said she fell into the water but was pulled out by another person on the boat. Two other passengers who fell into the water, including a young girl, drowned. Three other people died on the boat.
Heivin said she “really hated” the group of people who hijacked their boat, insisting they should take the blame for what happened.
“They caused a huge tragedy,” she said.
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Five die after migrant boat ‘hijacked’
“It was because of them that people died.
“If they hadn’t come and started fighting, none of this would have happened.”
Read more:
Arrests after deaths of five people who tried to cross Channel
Migrants explain why they won’t be deterred by Rwanda bill
The tragedy happened in the early hours of Tuesday morning in the waters off the French coastal town of Wimereux.
The boat, which launched with 112 people on board, stopped on a sandbar only a few hundred metres from the shore.
By the time emergency services arrived, it was clear people had died, both on the boat and in the water.
Two men have been charged with immigration offences in connection with the investigation into the deaths of the five migrants.
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French authorities struggle to intercept all small boats carrying migrants across the Channel.
“I fell into the water but a man helped me up,” Heivin said.
“Everyone was climbing aboard and there were too many people – over 110 of us.
“I had tried to be at the front, but after I fell in the water I sat on the edge of the boat and didn’t go towards the other end – that’s where people were fighting.
“I thank God that I didn’t get into the top part of the dinghy. I would have suffocated. I thank God for that every day.”
These men rushed on to the boat
She said her group, comprising between 50 and 60 people, had arrived at the beach in Wimereux after following the instructions of the people smugglers who had taken their money in exchange for arranging a passage to Britain.
Hidden away, they had waited for the smugglers to prepare the dinghy. She then saw police officers and was told simply to run towards the water.
At that point, the rival group emerged as well, clambering into the boat along with the people who had paid the smugglers.
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Heivin said she saw migrants from this group carrying sticks and knives, squaring up to both the police and the original passengers.
When the boat set off, exceptionally overladen, it meandered towards the Channel, but there was still fighting and it is clear that some people were being crushed.
“I was aware there was a fight,” Heivin said.
“They were shouting that people were stuck underneath other people, that they couldn’t get out, that some were falling under people’s feet.”
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Heivin has spent seven months travelling across Europe since leaving Iraq. She said she wanted to get to Britain because “it is a better country for me, definitely in terms of the language but also, in many other other ways, it is better than the rest of Europe”.
She’s made 30 attempts to cross the Channel, but has failed each time. Sometimes it has been the French police who have destroyed boats while other times the boat on which she was travelling broke down. One time, the boat failed only an hour from British waters.
She is undeterred by the trauma that she underwent, however, and she intends to try again to reach Britain as soon as possible. “Perhaps this weekend,” she said.
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