The UK Attorney General, Victoria Prentis, has ordered a review of the decision by prosecutors to accept manslaughter pleas in the Nottingham attacks case, which saw three people murdered. Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley-Kumar, both 19, were fatally stabbed on 13 June alongside Ian Coates, 65. Killer Valdo Calocane was given a hospital order after admitting manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. The review will also look into how the victims’ families were consulted, after they called for a public inquiry into the case and met Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Monday to discuss their concerns.
In an interview with ITV’s This Morning, Mr Sunak promised that “we will get the answers” to the victims’ families’ questions about what happened. Last week, the Crown Prosecution Service set out why it decided to accept a diminished responsibility plea for Calocane. It said medical experts provided “overwhelming” evidence the killer was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, which resulted in him hearing voices in his head telling him his family would be harmed unless he did what they told him to do. Three psychiatrists were asked to analyse Calocane’s condition and all agreed it “impaired his ability to exercise self-control”.
But Mr Webber’s mother Emma said the CPS had not consulted them, and said they had been “rushed, hastened and railroaded”, while Mr Coates’s son James said Calocane had “got away with murder”. The Attorney General’s announcement comes as a special review was ordered by the health secretary, which will see the Care Quality Commission (CQC) look into the Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, which treated Calocane. A separate NHS England Independent Mental Health Homicide Review will be carried out in the coming months, while the attorney general is also considering whether Calocane’s sentence was too lenient.
The police watchdog is also investigating after a referral by Leicestershire Police, which investigated alleged assaults by Calocane a few weeks before the attacks. Nottinghamshire Police has also said it “should have done more” to arrest the 32-year-old. The CPS said it would “fully engage” with the review
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