Blackburn man who stabbed stranger to death in her own home jailed for life
Charlotte Wilcock's 15-month-old daughter was inside at the time
Last updated 24th Aug 2023
A Blackburn man who stabbed a stranger to death in her own home, while her 15-month-old daughter slept upstairs, has been sentenced to life behind bars.
Anthony Stinson, 31, of Queen Victoria Street, Blackburn, will spend at least 24 years and two months in prison after pleading guilty to murder at Preston Crown Court earlier this week.
He approached Charlotte Wilcock, 31, who he had never met before, at around 9:10pm on 3 March 2023 as she sat on her doorstep and starting kicking and stamping on her.
The attack then continued inside her home where she was stabbed multiple times.
Her body was left behind the front door.
Charlotte's 15-month-old daughter was left alone upstairs all night until police were alerted the next day to what happened.
In the hours after the attack, Stinson changed his clothes. He left Charlotte's home with her phone and accidentally left his there, so he buried it in the back yard.
He spent the night walking across Blackburn and ended up in the Knuzden area, where CCTV showed him knocking on doors before he approached a passer-by and used their phone to call the police.
When he was arrested, he told officers that he believed he had killed someone and claimed he had been suffering with psychosis at the time and that he had seen the devil.
However, detectives found that an hour before the murder, he was making rap videos with a friend. The lyrics made reference to killing somebody.
Just 15 minutes before the killing, he was having a conversation with a shopkeeper while buying alcohol and cigarettes.
Det Ch Insp Mark Haworth-Oates, of Lancashire Police's Major Investigation Team, said:
"On March 3rd this year Stinson approached Charlotte’s address and, for reasons known only to him, launched a brutal attack on her on the doorstep. He slashed at her body numerous times in the ferocious assault – inflicting well over 50 individual injuries in the process, many with the use of a Stanley knife - as well as punching and kicking her.
"Charlotte had never met Stinson before that night and had no personal connection to him – she was merely sat on her own doorstep having a cigarette. She should have been safe and could never have foreseen what was about to happen.
"It is clear from speaking to Charlotte’s family that she was very much-loved, and her death has left a huge void in the lives of those who knew her, not least her two children who will now grow up without their mother. It is such a needless loss of a life in truly awful circumstances."