A homeless killer who stopped his sickening and torturous attack on a grandmother to watch TV has been jailed for 16 years.

Scott Hilling, 26, had been befriended by Kathleen Griffin, 57, after she felt sorry for him.

When visiting Kathleen in her Clacton home in Essex, Scott claims he heard voices telling him to end her life.

He then began a horrific attack on the grandmother, starting with a punch to the face that knocked her out and caused her to suffer brain damage.

Hilling then tied her wrists together, tortured her by cutting her body with a scalpel and stabbed her 14 times in the neck, chest, abdomen and back.

She died within minutes from four stab wounds to her chest.

Hilling, who had been taken in by his kind-hearted victim at her flat in Old Road, Clacton, because he was homeless, said he watched television in between stabbing her and watched it again afterwards over her lifeless body.

He then stripped her naked and washed her body. He tried to burn it with lighter fluid and then unsuccessfully tried to put it in a wheelie bin, the court heard.

Hilling, of no fixed address, had denied murder on 17 December last year but pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Scott Hilling admitted to Chelmsford Crown Court that he killed 57-year-old Kathleen Griffin at her Clacton home in December last year but has denied murder on the grounds of diminished responsibility
Scott Hilling was jailed for 16 years for his horrific attack against Kathleen

Yesterday a judge at Chelmsford Crown Court stopped the murder trial of Hilling on the basis that the prosecution had not called psychiatric evidence to counter evidence from two defence experts', one of whom had originally been intended as a prosecution witness, who considered Hilling suffered from mental illness , personality disorders and had a low IQ.

Sentencing Hill today for the manslaughter of Ms Griffin to which he had pleaded guilty the judge said it was "an horrific, savage killing" which had caused shock and revulsion. Hilling had intended to kill her.

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He said: "You tied her up and tortured her. She must have been petrified in those minutes or so before her death."

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He added: "This was a sickening and brutal killing of a defenceless woman, described as being kind hearted and generous. You repaid that generosity by killing her."

The judge made an order under the Mental Health Act which detains Hilling in a secure hospital to receive treatment "before or if" he is transferred to a prison to complete the remainder of his sentence.

The Parole Board would then consider whether he is no longer a risk to the public and could be released.

But during the week-long trial before the judge threw out the murder charge the jury heard that Hilling told psychiatrists while he was on remand that when he told Ms Griffin he was going to kill her she taunted and belittled him.

They said he had told them : "The voices were telling me to take her life. I got up went to kitchen and sat down with three knives and I said to Kat 'I have got to take your life'. She didn't believe me and she was laughing. I got up and stabbed her in the neck. She didn't even scream.

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"I just stared at her for two minutes and then stabbed her in the other side of the neck. She was on the floor. I got up again and stabbed her in the chest.

Chelmsford Crown Court heard how Scott tied up his victim and tortured her with a scalpel

"I sat back down and watched TV for 15 minutes, which was Channel 4 music and was listening to a song.

"I was not thinking about anything really. I remember there was a bread knife which wouldn't go through her skin so I put it back through the hole in the chest. I don't remember how many times I stabbed her."

Hilling claimed Ms Griffin was still talking to him as he was stabbing her.

He said he gave her a cigarette which she smoked while he was stabbing her and helped her to the toilet in between stabs. Afterwards he went to McDonald's to eat.

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The court heard that Hilling claimed he was sexually abused as a child by his father and had behavioural problems at school.

He was addicted to crack cocaine and heroin.

He was taken in by Ms Griffin, who he knew through a mutual friend, when he had nowhere to live on release from prison in September last year for theft of a television from a previous landlord.

After the sentencing, the Crown Prosecution Service issued a statement saying it respected the judge's decision to withdraw the murder charge from the jury.

However, they said they had considered there had been "sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction for murder and that a jury should hear the case for murder. "