Paul Crossley pushed Sir Robert Malpas on to tracks at Marble Arch in April last year

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

A man with schizophrenia who pushed a 91-year-old man on to tube tracks had taken £600 of crack cocaine the day before the attack, a court has heard.

Paul Crossley, 47, shoved Sir Robert Malpas on to the rails at Marble Arch station on 27 April last year, minutes after attempting to do the same to another man at Tottenham Court Road.

Malpas, a former co-chairman of Eurotunnel, was saved by Riyad El Hussani, a bystander, who pulled him up shortly before a train was due to arrive. El Hussani sustained a burn to his hand from the electrified rail.

Crossley, who has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was chased and caught by members of the public. He later said he had taken crack cocaine the previous day and began to feel paranoid as he went to get coffee.

He denied two counts of attempted murder at his trial last year, telling jurors he picked people at random and did not mean to kill them. But Crossley was found guilty at the Old Bailey in London in October.

At his sentencing hearing at the Old Bailey on Wednesday, Benjamin Aina QC, prosecuting, said: “When the defendant was arrested, he simply said ‘I’ve had no sleep’ – he later said he was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when he was 17.

“He was supposed to be taking medication for mental illness, but he had not taken any medication on that day. He had been using crack cocaine the day before the incident.

“Mr Crossley said when he was on the platform, he began to hear voices and was getting paranoid.”

Malpas, who was heading to Oxford Circus after a lunch, sustained a broken pelvis and a cut to the head that required 12 stitches, and spent more than a week in hospital following the attack.

A few minutes before, Crossley tried to push Tobias French on to tracks as the latter was making his way home.

French managed to fight him off, after which Crossley, of Leyton, east London, fled.

Crossley later told Dr Anneka John-Kamen, a psychiatrist, that he had gone to the West End after hearing the song West End Girls on the radio, believing it was giving him instructions – a condition referred to as “delusions of reference”.

He also told Dr John-Kamen that he remembered thinking he was going to “hurt someone” and was anxious because people he owed drug money to were threatening him.

The defendant also claimed he only meant to scare French and intended to push Malpas on to the floor.

When asked whether he would have pushed a woman or a child, Crossley told doctors he could never have done that.

The prosecutor questioned whether someone experiencing a psychotic episode would have shown “that level of distinction”.

The court heard Crossley was subject to three suspended sentences at the time of the attack – one for sexually assaulting a care worker, one for possession of a knife and one for racially abusing another care worker.

British Transport Police said: “We could easily have been dealing with a double murder investigation had it not been for the brave actions of the public who stepped in.”

Crossley’s sentencing hearing will continue on Thursday with further psychiatric evidence and is due to conclude on Monday.

The defendant is currently being held at a psychiatric facility in east London.