Son who stabbed mum and stepdad 20 times gets life
Killer tried to claim he acted in self-defence
AKNIFE-OBSESSED son butchered his mother and stepfather, stabbing them both more than 20 times in an orgy of violence – before searching for escorts on a laptop as they lay dead just yards away.
Evil Anmol Chana told a string of lies in a doomed bid to cover his tracks, claiming his mother had mistreated him and dismissing an injury he picked up in the struggle as the legacy of a fight with a stranger.
But the 25-year-old, who hatched a plot to steal cash from a Lidl and booked a flight to Italy, intending to flee the country, could not run from the truth.
A jury found him guilty of brutally murdering Jasbir Kaur, 52, and Rupinder Bassan, 51, at their home in Moat Road, Oldbury, in February this year.
And last Friday he was jailed for life, with a miminum term of at least 36 years.
During a trial at Birmingham Crown Court, Chana had claimed he acted in ‘frenzied’ self-defence and killed them lawfully – but jurors concluded he was lying.
It led to the question, was that the only time Chana had been untruthful to them?
On the fourth day of the trial he took to the witness box and claimed that, as a child, he had been subjected to sustained abuse, both physical and sexual, at the hands of his mother.
Going into graphic detail, he said the prolonged ordeal had left him “messed up” in the head and hating Mrs Kaur. But the claims were pure
“fantasy”, according
Jason Pitter QC.
Regarding the killings, Chana told the court he rowed with his mother “about the past” for around an hourand-a-half at her home on Saturday February 22. He accused the “wicked woman” of repeatedly calling him a “waste of space”.
When Mr Bassan returned home that evening, Chana claimed he came at him with a knife, with Mrs Kaur instructing to “finish him off”. Describing what happened next, Chana said: “There was a lot of struggling. The lights were off. I was not thinking anymore.”
But Mr Pitter pointed to the fact that both victims had been stabbed more than 20 times.
He told the jury: “You can safely conclude he was the aggressor and that he was not acting in reasonable lawful defence.”
to
prosecutor
Chana’s actions after the killings also gave an insight in to his callous mentality. He did not call for an ambulance.
Instead, he dragged both bodies to a rear living room, then sat a few feet away to search for female escorts on a laptop.
He also went to the pub to play pool, made a petrol bomb to burn Mr Bassan’s car, plotted to rob a Lidl shop and bought a plane ticket to Italy with the intention of fleeing the country.
Meanwhile, his sister Kiran had become fraught with worry at not being able to reach her mother on the phone. When Chana was arrested he arrogantly challenged the investigators by demanding ‘Where is the evidence?’.
When they duly showed it to him, he clammed up and replied “no comment”. There had been a number of warning signs of the defendant’s murderous potential throughout the years because Chana had started to act out his aggression from the age of ten.
Kiran said he got into trouble at school a lot and seemed like a “problem child”. She had also told the court of her brother’s “bizarre fascination” with knives and how she and her mother were forced to lock themselves in their rooms because Chana was being aggressive and violent.
She also revealed that knives had to be locked away in the home at one stage.
Chana himself dismissed the idea that he was “obsessed” and claimed he was merely interested in “antiques” and at times would carry a Kirpan whilst practising as an orthodox Sikh.
There were also the times he attacked his biological father after moving back to Corby, Northamptonshire, to live with him between 2010 and 2013.
On one occasion he soaked his socks in lighter fluid and set them on fire. On another, he took a knife to him and warned: “I could stab you”.
Then there was the chilling text messages Chana sent to his father in 2017 complaining about his mother. One of them read: “I want to knife her, pour oil down her throat and put her head in a chip pan.” Another message said: “Tell me how to get rid of that b **** bro.”
The court heard how, despite his behaviour, Jasbir and Rupinder wanted to “look after him” at their home in Moat Road.
After being arrested at his home in Hamilton Road, Smethwick, Chana denied any part in the killings during interview, telling officers “only God will judge”.