Man faces life behind bars for murder of postwoman

A MAN is facing life behind bars for the murder of a popular young woman.

Nicholas Rogers, 28, stabbed postal worker Alex Stuart to death at a house party in Peebles last August.

The terrified victim had cowered in tears as burly Rogers armed himself with a knife after wrongly thinking people were laughing at him.

He stabbed the 22-year-old in the chest seconds later after stating: ‘I may as well kill somebody.’

Rogers denied murder during a trial at the High Court in Glasgow, instead admitting he killed Miss Stuart while his ‘ability to determine or control his conduct was substantially impaired’ due to an ‘abnormality of mind’. The court heard he had been diagnosed with a personality disorder and deemed a risk to others days before the attack.

But jurors rejected his defence and convicted him of murder. Miss Stuart’s family sobbed as the verdict was announced.

Rogers, who fled after the attack, will learn the minimum term he will spend in jail when he returns to the dock next month. Lord Summers told him to ‘be under no illusion’ of the ‘gravity and seriousness’ of what he had done.

The judge added: ‘The sentence will fully reflect the devastation caused to the family and the wider community.’

Miss Stuart’s family were too upset to comment after the case.