Stabbed teacher held neck saying, I’m dying
TEACHER Ann Maguire clutched her wounded neck and told a colleague “I can’t breathe, I’m dying” after being stabbed in class by a pupil, an inquest heard yesterday.
Head of foreign languages Susan Francis heard “screaming” and found 61-year-old Mrs Maguire in the corridor.
She said killer Will Cornick, 15, showed “no emotion” after stabbing Spanish teacher Mrs Maguire eight times.
Mrs Francis said: “Ann came out and she was holding the back of her neck, I thought there had been a swarm of wasps at first. She kept repeating, ‘He has stabbed me in the neck’.
“I put her in the office and shut the door and put my foot against it. Will was at the other side of the door, motionless.
“I looked at him and screamed at my colleague Stuart. Ann kept saying, ‘He has stabbed me in the neck, he has stabbed me in the neck’.
“I just remember his face having no emotion on it, none at all.”
She added: “There was a massive knife on the floor outside the room. I could see cuts in her jumper and there was lots of blood coming from her neck.
“She said to me, ‘I can’t breathe, I’m dying, he has stabbed me in the lung’.”
Mrs Francis said paramedics “looked like they had walked into some Armageddon” as they tried to save Mrs Maguire at Corpus Christi Catholic College, in Leeds, in April 2014.
Cornick admitted murdering Mrs Maguire and was jailed for life.
The inquest at Wakefield Coroner’s Court continues.