A 'callous' Breaking Unhealthy copycat killer who stabbed a father-of-five within the head earlier than attempting to dissolve his physique in acid and conceal it in a wheelie bin has been jailed for all times.
George Knights, 19, was discovered responsible of homicide final June and was sentenced to life in jail on Friday, with a minimal of 23 years for the homicide of 38-year-old Stephen Chapman.
Knights had organized to satisfy the sufferer to purchase £2,500 value of cocaine at round 8pm earlier than going to a home get together in October 2020 - regardless of being just about penniless, a court docket heard.
After knifing Mr Chapman within the cranium with a military-style dagger, the teenager then tried to get rid of his sufferer's physique by overlaying it in acid and stuffing it in a wheelie bin - leaving it within the conservatory whereas he went to a home get together.
The sufferer died from a single stab wound from a double-edged navy dagger which had been embedded deep into the cranium.
Prosecutor Caroline Carberry QC informed the court docket Knights took inspiration from US medicine crime drama Breaking Unhealthy wherein the 2 lead characters dissolve a physique in a bucket of acid.
Maidstone Crown Court docket heard that Knights was determined for cash and informed a pal he deliberate 'to harm somebody' and rob them of £2,500 - the precise quantity of cocaine Mr Chapman had agreed to promote {the teenager} once they organized to satisfy at Knights's dwelling in Rochester, Kent.
After murdering the forklift driver, Knights went partying and bragged that he had killed somebody.
A selfie video on his cellphone additionally confirmed him on the enormous get together with a packet of cocaine within the background.
Within the week main as much as the deadly stabbing, Knights additionally had a tattoo with a snake wrapped round a knife just like the homicide weapon etched onto his neck.
Through the month-long trial, the jury heard Knights was a self-styled shares dealer who turned his kitchen into a medication manufacturing unit to provide amphetamines.
He purchased a £300 capsule presser from China and stashed sulphuric acid within the kitchen.
Knights additionally purchased and bought medicine and have become obsessive about knives - having a dagger, a machete and a knife from the Greek island of Crete in his home.
Detective Superintendent Gavin Moss, the senior investigating officer for the case, stated after the sentencing the defendant was 'devoid of human emotion'.
He added: 'All through this case Knights has proven no regret or empathy for his actions.
'He's a callous killer who robbed Stephen Chapman of his life, and on prime of this his try and get rid of the physique disadvantaged Mr Chapman's household of a chance to see him for a closing time.
'He prevented Mr Chapman from having a future along with his household and put them via the ordeal of a trial.
'He has been devoid of human emotion all through this case and is a transparent and apparent hazard to the general public.
'I am happy our investigation has led to his conviction. Knights offending has had a major influence on his household and nothing will undo this hurt however I hope that as we speak's sentencing can supply them a type of closure from this consequence.'
Choose Philip Statman stated no-one will ever know exactly what occurred after Mr Chapman arrived at Knights' dwelling in Rochester.
He informed the defendant: 'However it was your intention to rob him of the cocaine he was carrying. You're a one who likes to huge himself up, some might imagine a bragger. This was homicide for monetary achieve.
'And after the killing you confirmed a callous method once you went to a celebration and made a selfie.
'When the household of Mr Chapman referred to as you, you demonstrated a callous regard. Through the trial I noticed no regret in you though there are some indications now you're having an understanding of the longer term.'
When police questioned Knights within the wake of the killing he claimed he purchased medicine off the sufferer and was evasive about giving officers his identify and handle.
The following day a bunch of individuals arrived on the home the place Knights was dwelling, on the lookout for Mr Chapman, and so they referred to as police once they noticed the defendant run from the property.
Officers arrived and located blood-stained clothes, a big stash of sophistication A and B medicine and Mr Chapman's iPhone and financial institution card.
Knights was discovered at close by property and was initially arrested on suspicion of drug offences, however couldn't clarify the medicine and blood-stained clothes.
Officers later discovered the wheelie bin within the conservatory. It had Mr Chapman's physique inside, with 4 empty bottles of sulphuric acid close by.
Knights was then additionally arrested on suspicion of homicide.
Regardless of his bid to get rid of the physique, detectives weren't hindered as they have been ready to make use of current breakthroughs in forensic expertise to hold out a radical autopsy.
At court docket it was additionally revealed that the Knights had detailed notes of a sinister plan to kidnap 'the daughter of a tycoon' and maintain them for ransom.
Lists together with names, addresses and cellphone numbers of his supposed sufferer and her household have been discovered on his arrest, along with a police uniform
Prosecutor Caroline Carberry QC informed Maidstone Crown Court docket that the kidnapping and ransom plot was 'no idle fantasy', and supplied help that Knights poses a excessive threat of hazard to the general public.
{The teenager} was simply 18 when he plunged his dad's Royal Marine commando dagger 16cm-deep into Mr Chapman's cranium earlier than stealing a neighbour's plastic wheelie bin wherein to dump and douse the physique in six bottles of excessive focus drain cleaner.
Knights himself informed a jury he had been impressed by the ugly episode from season one of many award-winning Netflix sequence, and had a prepared provide of acid at hand from his personal amphetamine-producing enterprise.
The bodybuilder and cagefighting fan had by no means been in hassle with the police when he fatally stabbed 38-year-old Mr Chapman on October 23, 2020.
However Ms Carberry stated there was 'substantial proof of very worrying behaviour' in his background which had not been heard by the jury at his four-week trial final 12 months.
Detailing the kidnap plot and different threats of violence found by detectives, she informed the court docket: 'Notes he had written to himself the place he spoke of eager to knock somebody out, using insulin to take action, making a Taser, organising a monitoring machine and buying a police uniform fancy gown costume, which was present in his dwelling on the time of his arrest.
'Different notes included the plot to kidnap and maintain to ransom the daughter of a widely known vogue tycoon. That was no idle fantasy as a result of he had taken time to trace that daughter, document names and addresses of her household and their actual cellphone numbers.
'And from the assertion of his most up-to-date girlfriend, he had informed her all concerning the plot in some nice element.
'There was, in fact, no proof that the plot came about however there was lots of proof to counsel clear preparation for a kidnap.
'It definitely had bought to the planning levels and demonstrates he was severely contemplating utilizing violence in the direction of one other individual, probably together with kidnap, the use insulin to incapacitate, using restraint, gagging, risk and disguises.
'It additionally demonstrates the hazard that he poses to the general public.'
Police have been capable of converse to and alert his supposed sufferer, who has not been publically named.
Knights, who took insulin as a part of his steroid-taking cycle, informed his pal he may use it to inject his sufferer as it could 'trigger a coronary heart assault and kill with out leaving a hint'.
Ms Carberry stated it was the prosecution case the 'uncontrolled' teen, who had been utilizing steroids since he was 16, was 'fixated on cash' and that the killing of the 38-year-old, who was referred to as 'Ginger', was 'homicide for achieve'.
At his trial, his life-style was described as 'weird and stranger than fiction', specializing in utilizing, making and promoting each prescription and unlawful medicine.
He even used the identify of Breaking Unhealthy's lead character 'Walter White' - who himself made crystal methamphetamine - as a DVLA on-line account password reminder.
The jury additionally heard that Knights briefly returned dwelling to take weird pictures of Mr Chapman along with his ft holding the bin lid ajar.
The badly-decomposing physique was discovered two days later, nonetheless with the double-edged navy dagger in his head, after his determined household had damaged into Knights's dwelling.
Throughout their makes an attempt to search out him, {the teenager} had repeatedly lied to each police and Mr Chapman's pregnant girlfriend about his 'disappearance'.
Knights, who has a dagger entwined with a snake tattooed on his neck, had denied murdering Mr Chapman however was unanimously convicted in June.
Sentencing was adjourned for psychiatric and probation studies after Choose Philip Statman described the killing of Mr Chapman and subsequent concealment and degradation of his physique to be 'extraordinarily disturbing'.
Referring to the findings of the studies, Ms Carberry stated he had proven little regret and the present threat of 'bodily hurt leading to deadly penalties, was excessive.
She added that the psychiatrist had discovered no proof of any psychological sickness or dysfunction apart from nervousness.
'He concluded George Knights supplied a rehearsed and calculated account of occasions with little emotional involvement,' the prosecutor stated.
'He expressed some regret however continued to minimise his position and justify his actions and demonstrated an incapability to know the severity of his offending.
'In his evaluation, George Knights is a harmful offender.'
The court docket heard that inside minutes of assembly that evening, Knights had fatally stabbed Mr Chapman in what was a premeditated plan to 'rob, damage or kill'.
Giving proof, Knights, who left faculty earlier than taking his GCSEs however spoke of eager to turn into a 'self-employed shares and shares dealer', stated he believed the one means he may 'eliminate' Mr Chapman's physique was to repeat the notorious Breaking Unhealthy episode.
He informed the jury: 'I watched Breaking Unhealthy and in my insanity at that time I believed that the one means I may eliminate him was to do what they did in that movie. It was the one factor I may consider.
'I seemed up on my pc what acid it was and it was sulphuric acid, which is what I had utilized in an try and make amphetamine, and how much plastic you must put it in.
'The wheelie bin was the fitting plastic. I bought it from down the highway...I introduced it again to the home and put it within the conservatory.
'I put it on its facet...Then I pushed and pulled Ginger into the wheelie bin. Whereas I used to be doing that his footwear got here off.
'Clearly I wasn't considering straight in any respect. I did not put a fuel masks on or something like that. I bought acid which was already in the home and poured it on prime within the bin till I could not breathe anymore.
'Then I shut the conservatory doorways and I left.....I should not have performed what I did however I wasn't considering rationally at that time limit.'
The court docket heard that simply hours earlier than the homicide Knights had written a listing headed 'Knife' and together with gadgets corresponding to 'Superglue', 'masks' and 'wipes'.
Mr Chapman was stated to have been 'helpless in defending himself in opposition to a really robust younger man armed with a deadly weapon'.
Jurors have been additionally informed that his acid-doused physique posed such a public security threat that firefighters have been wanted to move him, nonetheless within the bin, to the mortuary at close by Medway Maritime Hospital.
Moreover, the autopsy examination couldn't be accomplished regardless of employees sporting full PPE clothes, together with heavy-duty gloves, a respirator and fuel masks.
In a tragic coincidence, Mr Chapman's girlfriend Rebecca Chief gave start to their third baby - his fifth - on the primary day of Knights's trial.
In a sufferer influence assertion she wrote how her 'world had been turned the other way up and her coronary heart torn into items'.
On the time of the killing, the couple have been saving to get married.
The court docket additionally heard that she had the added misery of getting to undergo the courts to have his identify placed on his daughter's start certificates.
Mr Chapman's sister Lisa Chapman spoke of the horror of discovering how his physique had been 'folded in a garbage bin like a bit of filth' and desecrated.
His former accomplice Louise Prince wrote an announcement on behalf of their 14-year-old son, saying she would always remember the look on his face when she informed him he would by no means see the daddy he 'worshipped' once more.
She additionally informed Knights: 'You've torn his world aside. You've damaged his coronary heart. You've actually ruined his life. He won't ever recover from this. It is going to hang-out him perpetually. My candy boy is damaged.
'You've performed this to him and for that I'll by no means forgive you. How does it really feel that his world has ended however yours nonetheless goes on.'
Jailing Knights for all times with a minimal time period of 23 years earlier than he will be launched on parole, Choose Statman stated his 'callous' efforts to get rid of Mr Chapman's physique and his lies to household looking for him have been of 'acute concern' as to only how harmful he was.
'You have been overlaying up occasions successfully in a copycat method of the storyline within the TV sequence, Breaking Unhealthy,' he informed {the teenager}.
'You have been capable of make these concerted efforts in an effort to be certain that the physique was desecrated by your additional conduct which exhibits an excessive aggravating characteristic on this case.
'This callous strategy was not one thing which will be defined away by some extent of tension or panic that you just had on the time.'
