A SCHIZOPHRENIC battered his girlfriend to death after he stopped taking his medication and became mentally unwell again, Liverpool Crown Court heard last week.

Paul Horrocks launched a frenzied attack on 24-year-old Carol Houghton at his Wirral home over the Christmas holiday and then called the ambulance service.

Paramedics found her lying dead on her back in his living room with severe head and facial injuries.

When arrested, he told police that they had a fight and he kicked her in the head because she had made him paranoid by talking about the IRA.

The court heard that in 1994 Horrocks was made the subject of a hospital order after attacking his parents and stabbing a policeman in the thigh.

At the time of the attack on his girlfriend he was living at his home in Menai Street, Birkenhead, and had stopped taking his medication, said David Steer, QC.

Horrocks, aged 28, denied murder but pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility, which was accepted by the prosecution.

Judge David Maddison made an indefinite hospital order and was told that a bed is available for Horrocks at the Scott Clinic at Rainhill Hospital.

Sentencing him, Judge Maddison said that he had caused dreadful injuries to his victim. "She was from a close family whose loss is immeasurable."

He said he was satisfied at the time of the tragedy that Horrocks was, and still is, suffering from chronic schizophrenia. An indefinite hospital order was necessary to protect the public from the risk of serious harm, said Judge Maddison.

Mr Steer said that Horrocks and Miss Houghton, the youngest of five, started a stormy relationship last Summer. He was violent to her sometimes and on one occasion she was kept in hospital overnight but she told the police that she had been injured in a fall.

Miss Houghton, of Claughton Road, Birkenhead, spent most of Christmas at her parents' adjacent home. On December 26 she rang her parents from his home and seemed perfectly normal and happy, said Mr Steer.

At 3am the next day Horrocks called the ambulance service. Paramedics found Miss Houghton's injuries included a large, gaping wound between her eyes. A post mortem examination revealed the cause of death as blunt force head and facial injuries. She had suffered four such blows to the head and at least 12 to the face.

The injuries were so severe that they had probably been caused by his feet or a weapon, said Mr Steer.

When interviewed, Horrocks said he he had not heard voices in his head for some time but had heard them on the night of the killing.

Defence counsel, Mr Richard Henriques, QC, said that Horrocks had delusional beliefs about the IRA and prostitutes.

"The medical profession appeared to have brought his psychotic beliefs under control, but in late 1998 he stopped his medication with this tragic consequence," he said.

"He deeply regrets what he acknowledges to be his fault," he added.

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