Killer is first woman to be sentenced on TV
‘Healer’ who decapitated widow will serve at least 34 years
A COLD-BLOODED killer who decapitated her friend in a plot to inherit her £700,000 estate has become the first woman in England to be handed a life sentence on TV.
Jemma Mitchell was told yesterday she must serve at least 34 years for the murder of devout Christian Mee Kuen Chong, 67.
Self-styled healer Mitchell, who boasted of her skill in human dissection, denied having anything to do with Ms Chong’s death and declined to give evidence at her trial.
Sitting at the Old Bailey, Judge Richard Marks KC, told her: “You have shown absolutely no remorse and it appears you are in complete denial as to what you did.
“The enormity of your crime is profoundly shocking, even more so given your apparent religious devotion and the fact [Ms] Chong was a good friend to you and had shown you great kindness.” The court heard Mitchell, 38, of Willesden, north-west London, had befriended vulnerable widow Ms Chong, who suffered from schizophrenia, through a church group. When Ms Chong backed out of giving her £200,000 for repairs to her rundown £4million home, Mitchell killed her and forged a will to inherit the bulk of her estate, worth more than £700,000. Mitchell claimed Ms Chong had gone to visit family friends as she was feeling depressed. But, the court heard, she had decapitated Ms Chong and stored her remains in the garden of the house she shared with her retired mother.
On June 26 last year, Mitchell drove more than
200 miles to Devon in a hire car with Ms Chong’s body, stuffed in a suitcase, in the boot. She dumped her remains in woods near picturesque seaside town Salcombe.
Ms Chong’s body was found the next day. Her head was recovered nearby during a police search.
CCTV footage showed Mitchell arriving at Ms Chong’s home in Wembley, north-west London, with the suitcase on June 11.
More than four hours later, she was seen emerging, with the suitcase appearing bulkier and heavier.
She also had a bag full of Ms Chong’s financial documents.
No forensic evidence was recovered from the case, but Ms Chong’s DNA was found on a bloodstained tea towel, the jury heard.
Mitchell, a trained osteopath, claimed on her website she was “attuned to subjects in neuroanatomy, genetics and dissection of human cadavers”.
It is only the second time cameras have recorded an English criminal crown court sentencing. It is the first in a murder case where
the defendant is a woman.