Nicola Edgington

On 7 February 2013 at the Old Bailey, Edgington was convicted by jury of the attempted murder of Clark and of the murder of Hodkin. Judge Brian Barker jailed her for life on 4 March 2013, with a minimum tariff of 37 years. Barker wrote that despite Edgington's firm long-standing diagnosis of schizophrenia and probable psychosis around the time of the attacks, he believed the over-riding factor was borderline personality disorder (in the UK usually referred to in ICD terms as Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder, Borderline Type) with rational ability. He referred to a recent medical report indicating no need for hospital treatment for Edgington. Despite Edgington having sought multiple times to have herself detained by the police or medical services prior to her actions, Barker stated that the killing was premeditated in a way that showed a "consistent and calculated course of criminal conduct". Barker included the random and unprovoked nature of the attacks as aggravating factors indicating more guilt, while disregarding the mitigating factor of mental disability since the psychiatric authorities disagreed about it.

In September 2011, Edgington sent a message via Facebook to her brother saying she was not getting the help she needed, missed her mother, and had had a miscarriage. She left her phone number and asked him not to tell their father, Harry, that she had made contact. Her brother replied that she killed their mother and he found the body, that the miscarriage was good news, and that she should kill herself by cutting her wrists.

On the morning of 10 October 2011, Edgington pleaded numerous times with police and local mental health services to physically detain her under their legal powers as she felt she was having another psychotic breakdown, saying she had killed someone before and that the more scared she became the more dangerous she could be. Although taken to Queen Elizabeth hospital, she was left there by police prior to being securely admitted, and the psychiatric staff decided they were only going to admit her on a voluntary basis despite her risk profile and secure care plan being in her psychiatric file.

Later in the morning of 10 October 2011, while waiting for staff to change shift and admit her, Edgington left the hospital through a door that should have been locked, took two buses, and stabbed two strangers in the street in separate attacks in Bexleyheath. She bought a knife from Asda with which she tried to kill 22-year-old Kerry Clark, who survived and a member of the public took the knife off her. Edgington subsequently stole a knife from a butcher's shop and stabbed and virtually decapitated 58-year-old Sally Hodkin, who died of her injuries within minutes. Edgington was arrested later the same morning.

On 4 November 2005, Edgington stabbed her 60-year-old mother, Marion, nine times in Forest Row, East Sussex for which she was convicted of manslaughter due to diminished responsibility (based on diagnoses of schizophrenia and emotionally unstable personality traits) at Lewes Crown Court on 23 October 2006. She was detained indefinitely under the Mental Health Act 1983 and, following treatment and psychiatric evaluation, was released conditionally in September 2009, moving into a Greenwich flat.

Nicola Edgington (born 9 September 1980) is a British woman convicted of manslaughter due to diminished responsibility, attempted murder and murder.