This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A man who battered his 11-year-old great-niece to death with a table leg has been found guilty of manslaughter.

Delroy Forrester, 51, admitted killing Jasmine Forrester in an attack on 9 February. He inflicted almost 100 “catastrophic” injuries on her body before shouting “the devil had to die”. He denied murder on the grounds that he was legally insane.

A jury at Wolverhampton crown court heard that a few days before the incident, Forrester had been suffering from a psychotic disorder, which his daughter, Tyler Forrester, had tried to report to a hospital crisis team.

Tyler Forrester was angry that her father was not in hospital and had called Penn hospital in Wolverhampton before the incident to ask for help. The hospital is a major provider of mental health services.

After the hospital told her it could not assist her father, Tyler Forrester replied: “You’d better make sure he doesn’t kill my nan tonight.”

Forrester, formerly of Lower Villiers Street in Blakenhall, was convicted of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility after a four-day trial. He will be sentenced on 24 September.

Forrester had wanted to kill his son Myles, the court heard, and was later heard referring to Jasmine as “pure and innocent”.

Police had been called to the house of Delroy Forrester’s mother and Jasmine’s great-grandmother, Victoria Forrester, in Kent Road, Wolverhampton, in the early hours, after the 79-year-old raised the alarm with her neighbour.

The Crown Prosecution Service’s Giovanni D’Alessandro said: “Jasmine was a friendly, caring and well-liked girl who had a bright future ahead of her. This was all taken away by Delroy Forrester.

“On the night of the murder, he attacked his elderly mother and, while she tried to get help, used a series of improvised weapons to launch a frenzied attack on Jasmine, inflicting serious injuries to her head and body.

“This was a tragic incident and our thoughts are with Jasmine’s family and friends.”