A father accused of murdering his 22-month-old daughter and former partner with a machete, hammer and screwdriver claimed he lost control after his girlfriend killed their baby in a “demonic ritual”.
Roland McKoy, 54, is on trial at the Old Bailey, in London, for allegedly killing Valerie Forde, 45, a community worker, and their toddler, Real Jahzara, on the day Forde set a deadline for him to move out of the family home in Hackney, north London.
McKoy told jurors that he hit Forde with a hammer in self-defence before blacking out. He denies murdering his daughter, blaming it instead on his former partner, who he found mumbling like she was “talking with the spirits”.
On 31 March 2014 Forde had asked him to leave their home and had gone into the bathroom to run a bath and get ready for work at a community project.
McKoy, a handyman, said he felt like he was “floating” and like his “world was closing” when he discovered his youngest daughter dead on the landing.
He told the court: “She was just lying still on the floor and I just ran to her and picked her up and I just realised she was floppy. I could see the blood come on her neck. I think my personal world was closing.”
He went into the bathroom to find Forde, he said.
“I said ‘Mummy’. She was like whispering and talking, making sounds. I went to touch her and by the time I did she put one leg up to against the wall and she started punching me.
“I reached out for the hammer and used it to defend myself to get away.”
He told the court that he blacked out after hitting Forde between three and five times with the hammer. He accepted there was no-one else in the house who could have inflicted the other wounds.
When the police arrived, alerted by a call from Forde’s eldest daughter, Carrise, 28, who was listening to the attack on an open line, they found mother and daughter dead, with terrible injuries. Forde had 17 hammer blows to her head, lacerations to her head, face and neck and stab wounds. Real Jahzara had a machete wound across her throat.
When McKoy, who was lying in a foetal position on the floor, beside the hammer, screwdriver and machete, was roused by police, he vomited bleach, the court heard.
McKoy, who emigrated from Jamaica in 1989, said: “I just don’t know how I felt at the time. Maybe I just felt like I was floating. I could not get away even though I wanted to get away. I just couldn’t control myself. When I saw the baby dead, I just did not know.”
Defending, Bernard Richmond QC said: “The prosecution are saying you did that to Real?”
McKoy replied: “No I didn’t. Once I saw Real on the floor I picked her up. When she didn’t respond I can remember going to her to investigate, to find out how come this has happened.”
Asked what Forde was doing, the defendant said: “When she said that ritual … the chants she made, she takes hours … she would be talking with the spirits.”
He denied trying to kill himself by drinking disinfectant afterwards, saying: “I was very hot and thirsty and sleepy … I was just so thirsty so I just started to drink things from the bathroom to quench my thirst.”
Earlier, McKoy told jurors Forde had suffered from postnatal depression, their relationship went downhill and she turned to demonic rituals with oils and candles to speak to dead relatives and would enter a trance.
McKoy also told jurors that he loved Real Jahzara the most which caused some “jealousy” within the family. At this point in his evidence, an observer in the public gallery stormed out.
The trial continues.
