Care worker who stabbed neighbour 11 times is jailed

A Kent care worker who stabbed her neighbour 11 times in a row over noise has been jailed for six-and-a-half years.

Helen Tillcock, 43, was sentenced at Maidstone Crown Court on Thursday for the "frenzied" attack on Sarah Hodges, who received injuries to her face, head and chest on 20 July last year.

The pair had once been friendly, even sharing Christmas dinner together at their homes on Barnsole Road in Gillingham, before relations "soured", the court heard.

Previously cleared of attempted murder during a trial at the same court in January, Tillcock was later found guilty of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

On the night of the attack, a drunken Tillcock was said to have been "antagonising" by "deliberately and loudly" slamming her front door, causing Hodges to shout at her.

Then, when Hodges went into the communal back garden, her neighbour emerged with a kitchen knife in her hand.

The defendant had told the jury she had the knife because she was planning on making cheese and crackers, but then claimed she had been unaware she was holding it.

Judge Catherine Moore called her account "not credible".

Moore also said the jury had clearly rejected Tillcock's claim of self-defence, adding that she had been the "aggressor", with any injuries sustained being the result of Hodges defending herself.

Tillcock had become "increasingly frustrated" with Hodges in the lead-up to the attack, said the judge.

However, she added that prior messages sent by Tillcock to others, including how she wanted to kill Hodges and a reference to her cat being killed, had not been indicative of a more "sinister intention".

Prosecutor Rio Pahlavanpour told the court how Hodges recalled being struck and blood running down her face, before slumping on to her bathroom floor and calling an ambulance.

In a victim impact statement read to the court, she said she had lost the love for her life and struggled to find joy.

She had gone from being an "outgoing" person to "suddenly unable to face people closest to me".

The court heard that Tillcock had been hiding in a boiler cupboard in a nearby flat when officers eventually located and arrested her.

Ben Irwin, defending, said that Tillcock's life was "bluntly miserable, difficult and filled with hardship", but the care worker had "continued to help other people".

He added that she accepted what had happened, but was "bitterly regretful of doing that to another person."

Additional reporting by PA Media.

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