Murder: Judge describes "brutal" crime as McCormick begins sentence

Friday 09 January 2015

Handing down the sentence of the Royal Court yesterday afternoon, Bailiff Sir Michael Birt described the murder as a brutal crime, for which the reason was still unknown.

After the court had deliberated for 45 minutes, he announced the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment, adding that McCormick would serve a minimum of 25 years before he could be considered for release - by that time he will be in his early 60s.

Sir Michael said: “This was a brutal murder which, as with all murders, has devastated the victim’s family. The victim, Colin Chevalier, was lying in his bed, he was offering no threat to the defendant, yet the defendant attacked him in an appallingly violent manner.

“He used an axe, which belonged to the victim, to strike him repeatedly about the head and face. The Court is quite satisfied that in this case there was an intention to kill, rather than an intention to cause serious bodily harm.

“The defendant then used the axe and a knife to mutilate the victim’s body. The mutilation included attempts to cut off the victim’s right hand and successfully cutting off his right ear.

“The pathologist concluded that there had been over 50 separate actions on the defendant’s part which had produced 41 wounds.

“The reason for the murder is unknown, but the background is that Mr Chevalier had supplied the defendant and others with controlled drugs and at the time the defendant had taken a cocktail of drugs, both licit and illicit.

“This is not the first time that the defendant had attacked a man lying in his bed. In 2002 he kicked in the door of the victim in that case, smashed a bottle which he was holding, and then stabbed the victim repeatedly with the broken glass.

“Fortunately the landlady called an ambulance and the victim was taken to hospital for emergency resuscitation. As the court said at the time, it was a frenzied attack and had the victim not obtained the help of the landlady he might have died from his injuries.”

Sir Michael went on to go through the legal arguments about starting points and mandatory terms – saying that the Jurats had unanimously decided on a minimum sentence of 25 years, although he added that some had reached that point via a different calculation of the starting point, aggravating factors and mitigation to the rest.

He said: “For the benefit of the public, we do emphasise that this does not mean that the defendant will be released at the end of this period. That will be up to the relevant authorities at the time, having regard to whether he is still a danger to the community… In summary, the Court is unanimous in its decision, albeit that the reasons have varied. Stand up McCormick – the Court sentences you to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 25 years, from which will be deducted any time already served.”