Families to fight on for victims of triple killer

THE families of the victims of triple killer Valdo Calocane have reiterated their calls for a public inquiry into the deaths after the Court of Appeal heard a bid to change his sentence.

The relatives of Barnaby Webber, Grace O’Malley-Kumar and Ian Coates said “failure upon failure upon failure” contributed to the killings in Nottingham on June 13 last year.

They spoke after three judges heard a bid from the Attorney General’s Office to change Calocane’s sentence, arguing that the indefinite hospital order he was given in January was“unduly lenient ”.

Lawyers told the hearing that the 32-year-old, who has paranoid schizophrenia, should be given a life sentence as part of a “hybrid” order, meaning he would be treated in hospital before serving the remainder of his sentence in prison.

The Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr said a decision would be given “within seven days or so” but recognised the “acute anxiety and distress involved in this very, very tragic case”.

Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice following the hearing, Dr Sanjoy Kumar, father of Ms O’ M alley-Kumar, said :“Valdo Calocane murdered our children and Ian Coat es, and it’ s very, very hard for all of us in this process when what we should be doing is grieving for our children, but we are here instead fighting for them.

“But we will fight. We will fight all of the organisations that failed us, and what is becoming abundantly clear is the long list of people and organisations that failed us.”

Calocane fatally stabbed 19-yearold university students Mr Webber and Ms O’Malley-Kumar 10 and 23 times respectively as they walked home from a night out in the early hours of June 13, in what prosecutors described as an “uncompromisingly brutal” attack.

He then went on to stab Mr Coates, a 65-year-old school caretaker, 15 times and stole his van which he used to knock down three pedestrians – Wayne Birkett, Marcin Gawronski and Sharon Miller – in Nottingham city centre before being arrested.

He later admitted three counts of manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility and three counts of attempted murder, with prosecutors accepting his notguilty pleas to murder charges based on medical evidence.

One psychiatrist told the court that Calocane was suffering a “severe psychotic episode” at the time of the attacks, with others raising concerns over the risks to other prisoners if a hybrid sentence was imposed, and that Calocane’s paranoid schizophrenia is treatmentresistant.