Man who decapitated elderly woman found legally insane

Nicholas Salvador was living three doors away from Palmira Silva when he went on a ‘45-minute rampage’. Photograph: Metropolitan Police/PA

A MAN with paranoid schizophrenia has been cleared of the murder of an 82-year-old woman in north London after a jury found him to be legally insane.

Palmira Silva was in her back garden in Edmonton when Nicholas Salvador, 25, stabbed and decapitated her in Edmonton in September last year, the Old Bailey had been told.

A jury of six women and six men found the aspiring cagefighter not guilty by reason of insanity and he will be detained indefinitely in a psychiatric hospital.

The jury was required to hear evidence of the horrific killing despite the prosecution and defence agreeing a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity was appropriate.

There was no dispute that Salvador had killed Italian-born Silva, who ran a cafe, at her home on 4 September, but in what lawyers working on the trial described as a “legal quirk”, the jury had to determine whether he was legally insane.

Under 172-year-old legislation, prosecutors cannot agree to a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity. It can only be returned by a jury that has heard evidence from at least two registered medical practitioners.

Jonathan Rees QC, prosecuting, told the jury on Monday that this type of trial did not arise often in criminal courts.

Jurors were shown footage captured by a police helicopter of Salvador armed, topless and leaping over garden fences near Silva’s home. They were spared images of the killing and its aftermath.

Salvador, whose mother lives in Nottingham and father lives in Nigeria, was living with his best friend’s family three doors away from Silva in Nightingale Road at the time of the killing.

Armed with items from the house, he killed two of his hosts’ cats, which he believed were demons, before making his way through back gardens, smashing his way into another house and attacking a car in what prosecutors described as a 45-minute rampage.
He then went back through the house and into an alleyway that ran alongside Silva’s home. The victim, who had two children, six grandchildren and one great-grandchild, had wandered into her back garden and approached Salvador who leapt over a wall into her garden and attacked her.
Silva died from multiple stab wounds and would not have been alive when she was decapitated. Afterwards, the defendant ran through gardens at the back of the terraced houses and tore down fences, while police tried to evacuate nearby residents, including children.

He was finally arrested by armed officers in the front room of another house in Nightingale Road “after a violent and chaotic struggle” during which he was Tasered six times.

Commentary from officers attending the incident was played to the jury over the helicopter footage, which shows Salvador pacing around back gardens.

“He’s armed with what looks like a knife and a small pole,” one officer said. “Looks like he has killed a dog or something in the back garden.”

“Any units down on Nightingale Road, get to as many premises as you can and get people away from this location,” an officer said. “He has decapitated a woman,” the commentary continued. “He is agitated and lethal. He needs taking out.”

Psychiatrists for the prosecution and defence told jurors that Salvador had paranoid schizophrenia. He has been receiving treatment at Broadmoor hospital and will remain at the institution.

Salvador had held various jobs after completing a media studies course at college, including as a fitness instructor, but lost his work pasting advertisements on billboards three days before the attack.

Salvador’s friends told police he regularly smoked skunk cannabis, took cocaine and had been known to drink whole bottles of spirits each day. – theguardian.com