A cannabis addict who killed three generations of his girlfriend’s family when years of smoking pot turned him into a homicidal maniac is facing life in jail.
Samantha Drummonds, 27, her mother Tanysha Ofori-Akuffo, 45, her grandmother Dolet Hill, 64, and Ms Hill’s husband, chef Denton Burke, 58, were all stabbed to death by Joshua Jacques, 29.
The ‘bloodbath’ took place at Mr Burke’s and Ms Hill’s home on Delaford Road, Bermondsey, southeast London, in the early hours of 25 April last year.
Jacques had been smoking pot from the age of 12 and hours before the killings Ms Drummond had phoned her best friend several times to raise concerns about his mental state.
In a voice note she said: ‘Josh is basically getting to the point where he could basically have an episode, like I don’t know what’s triggered him.’
After killing the family Jacques made a FaceTime call to his mother in the locked bathroom and said: ‘I’m ending it, I’m gonna make a sacrifice.’
He was told armed police were at the house and he should come out with his hands on top of his head.
Jacques, emerged naked and prostrated himself in a praying position, shouting: ‘Allah, take me!,’ ‘Kill me now,’ ‘Get rid of me,’ and ‘God please forgive me.’
He had denied four counts of murder but an Old Bailey jury convicted him on each charge today (Thurs).
Jacques had admitted four counts of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
Sentencing is expected to be adjourned until the new year.
Jacques had been hospitalised in a psychiatric ward in 2018 and diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
Dr Nigel Blackwood, a forensic psychiatrist for the prosecution, said the symptoms of manic behaviour displayed were caused by the large amount of cannabis he had consumed.
He told the court: ’The defence psychiatrists maintain there was a serious mental illness which recurs in the context of cannabis use.’
He said it was his view that the symptoms ‘could be entirely produced by the cannabis use he was using at that time’ without an underlying condition.
Jacques was a cannabis user from the age of 12 and became a drug dealer.
Dr Blackwood said he believed drug use was also the cause of Jacques’ behaviour in 2018 and that he did not have bipolar disorder.
‘The symptoms were consistent with a manic episode but to me, it was driven by his drug use at that time,’ he said.
He said what Jacques experienced was a ‘drug induced mania with psychotic features’.
Jacques had also been taking MDMA, a form of ecstasy, in the days leading up to the killings.
Giving evidence for the defence, pychiatrist Dr Raman Deo said Jacques was ‘manic and paranoid on a number of issues’.
He said: ‘My opinion is that on balance the abnormality of mental function arising from bipolar disorder would have been a significant factor in the killings.’
Tom Little, KC, prosecuting, had described what police officers found when they entered the property shortly after 2am.
‘The first police officer to enter the house tried to open the porch door.
‘He could not open it fully initially because it was blocked. The reason why it was blocked was on the other side of the door was Denton Burke’s body.
‘He was lying face down on a foldable clothes rail, between the porch door and the stairs.
‘His legs were directly behind the door, and his torso was in the hallway.
‘He was not breathing, and was unresponsive. He was removed from the property by police. A large cut to his throat was noted.
‘The same police officer then saw three women in the kitchen. He believed them to be dead.
‘He then went to the kitchen. The females were heaped together, and he and other officers then had to separate them.
‘Samantha Drummonds was wearing a top under a denim jacket, and was naked from the waist down.
‘The officer saw a stab wound to the right side of her abdomen, with her intestines protruding, and noted that she had no pulse.
‘The kitchen area was cramped and so her body was moved outside. Further wounds to her neck and back were noted, and there had been severe blood loss.
‘A paramedic and a police officer brought Dolet Hill, from the kitchen out into the hallway. She was wearing a pink nightdress and underwear.
‘The paramedic cut away her upper clothing to reveal multiple wounds.
‘A paramedic and police officers moved Tanysha Ofori-Akuffo away from the wall of the kitchen. Wounds were seen on her upper chest, neck, and upper back.’
Ms Hill was found to have sustained multiple stab wounds to her shoulder and chest, with the fatal injury being a 21cm-deep stab wound to the left side of her chest that had gone through her heart.
Mr Burke had suffered multiple injuries to his face, mouth and body, including a large cut to his neck, as well as a significant head injury and fractures to his face and jaw.
Ms Ofori-Akuffo died after suffering from a 12.5cm stab wound to the left side of her chest which had gone through her heart, as well as cut injuries to her chest, neck, back and left thigh.
Ms Drummonds died after sustaining multiple stab wounds to her back, side and neck, which caused internal injuries to her lungs, liver and right kidney.
Mr Little had told jurors there was ‘no dispute or issue other than that it was the defendant that killed all four of the victims and that he did so by attacking them.
‘In doing so he stabbed, cut and slashed all of them with a knife or knives.
‘The prosecution case is that this is a clear case of murder, indeed more accurately a clear case of quadruple murder.
‘We say that the defendant killed his victims with murderous intent and there’s no dispute about that, and that when he did so his ability to form a rational judgment and to exercise self-control were not substantially impaired by any psychiatric condition.
‘And indeed that his conduct on that night was brought about by self-induced intoxication, here taking drugs and drinking alcohol.
‘This, we say, led to a transient psychotic disorder which does not meet the requirements for the defendant to make out a partial defence of diminished responsibility.’
Ms Ofori-Akuffo, also known as ‘Racquel’, was a qualified nurse while her mother Ms Hill had worked as a housekeeping assistant at Guy’s and St Thomas’s hospital in Westminster for 21 years before retiring in 2018.
Jacques, of Minard Road, Lewisham, admitted four counts of manslaughter but denied four counts of murder on the grounds of diminished responsibility.