Director in frenzied attack on couple

Dec 9 2008 The Journal

A FORMER businessman tried to kill his ex-partner and her new boyfriend in a horrific premeditated knife attack.

Ex-landlord of the Cooperage pub on Newcastle Quayside, Graham Mitchell, was unable to live with the breakdown of his relationship with Polish-born Magda Tychmann, Newcastle Crown Court heard.

Armed with a dagger, he forced his way into her boyfriend Jorg Carballo’s flat in the early hours and confronted the couple in the bedroom. There he punched Ms Tychmann to the floor, ignoring her pleas, and stabbed her in the throat, severing her jugular vein and telling her: “It’s over.”

And when she attempted to escape, he tried to smother her with a cushion before stabbing Mr Carballo 15 times in the neck and chest after warning him he was going to die.

Ms Tychmann, 25, finally fled the third-floor flat in Bewick House and collapsed at the entrance to Newcastle Central Station while Mr Carballo used the fire alarm to alert help after Mitchell left.

The couple, who may have survived by feigning death, were taken to Newcastle General Hospital.

Ms Tychmann had suffered a single penetrating, potentially fatal wound to the neck while her boyfriend’s injuries included stab wounds to the chest which caused lung damage and one which narrowly missed his heart. He also suffered a stroke. Mitchell, 45, formerly of Woodhead Road, Walkergate, Newcastle, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to two counts of attempted murder.

He was yesterday jailed indefinitely under laws designed to protect the public from dangerous offenders and must serve at least 10 years before he may be considered for parole.

Passing sentence, Judge David Hodson told him: “This was a premeditated and quite determined attempt to kill the woman with whom you had had an intimate sexual relationship. You decided to kill not only Miss Tychmann, but her new boyfriend as well.”

The judge described the attack on Ms Tychmann as frenzied and said without prompt medical help “there is no doubt whatever she would have died”. He said Mr Carballo had also suffered grave injuries and the attacks had had long term physical and psychological consequences for both victims. Peter Walsh, defending, said Mitchell had mental health difficulties. He said it was clear from text messages Mitchell sent Ms Tychmann in the days before the stabbings he was in emotional turmoil, planning if anything to harm himself rather than her.

He said Mitchell – who has been a director of several North East companies, including Unique Leisure Ltd – had felt a “sense of betrayal”, having provided Ms Tychmann and a number of her relatives with work and accommodation.

Ms Tychmann moved to Newcastle to study at Northumbria University and met Mitchell while working as a barmaid at the Cooperage. Mr Corballo is a graduate, originally from Tenerife.