Pic: Amanda Slater

Daniel Coriat, a man who killed his mother and chopped off her head because he thought she was a witch, has been sentenced to life imprisonment in a secure institution.

He appeared at the Old Bailey today January 29, to receive his sentence after pleading guilty.

Judge Richard Hone ordered Coriat to be detained at Broadmoor secure hospital without limit of time. He said: “The public has to be protected from a reoccurrence of this bizarre, grisly and grotesque violence.”

Coriat, 44, inflicted nearly 50 separate injuries on his mother, 76-year-old Elisabeth Coriat, before decapitating her.

His mother was found on her bed at the flat they shared in Forest Hill, Lewisham,  in March last year. Coriat was found hiding in a wheelie bin at a local railway station.

He told the police he was the son of God and had been living in the bin since coming down from the sky, said Sarah Plaschkes QC, prosecuting.

His mother had told an advice worker that her mentally ill son could turn nasty when he was not taking his medication.

Plaschkes said Coriat was seen completely naked outside the flat the morning after his mother was last seen alive.