Ex-Oxford student admits Harrow stabbing

LONDON, July 13 (Reuters) A former Oxford student was ordered locked in a secure mental hospital indefinitely after admitting to hacking a Harrow schoolmaster's daughter to death at her home.

William Jaggs, 23, pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey Central Criminal Court to the manslaughter of Lucy Braham last September on the grounds of diminished responsibility through mental illness.

Jaggs, ''a sexual predator in the making'', stripped and stabbed Braham, 25, aspiring fashion designer, at least 67 times, the prosecution said yesterday.

The would-be actor, who had a drugs problem, was found by police in the kitchen of Braham's Harrow-on-the-Hill family home stabbing himself in the torso and abdomen.

A knife, wood saw, pair of scissors and a pair of secateurs were found nearby, covered in blood.

Braham's family said they had ''different shades of opinion'' on the manslaughter plea.

In an impact statement read to the court, they said: ''We trust in the expertise of doctors and the judiciary to make sure he is never freed while he poses a threat to another human being.'' Braham ''fought with tremendous courage to defend her dignity and her right to be the person she chose to be against the armed coward and bully who had invaded her home,'' they said.

They remembered her ''gentleness, kindness, compassion, modesty, grace and beauty'' and described her as a hugely talented artist and designer who walked with her ''eyes always open to beauty in both the natural and the man-made world''.

Judge David Bean said Jaggs would likely never be released.

REUTERS SW HS0850