After she was viciously stabbed by her employer’s son, they sent her one single text message. A young man who “brutally” stabbed and strangled a housekeeper at his family’s Chelsea, west London home has been sentenced to an indefinite hospital order with restrictions.
Maximillian Bourne, 26, attacked Joselia Pereira Do Nascimento at the multimillion-pound home on February 25 2024. Bourne, the son of a wealthy art collector, then called 999 and told the operator he had stabbed a “demon woman”. Ms Nascimento was left permanently scarred by the attack.
Southwark Crown Court also heard she had received no help or support from Bourne’s “extremely wealthy” family in the months since. Bourne was sentenced on Tuesday, the anniversary of the stabbing. He had been charged with attempted murder, but was deemed unfit to stand trial because of his mental health.
After a one-day trial, a jury decided – after just minutes of deliberation – that he had committed the act charged against him. Judge Gregory Perrins described how Ms Nascimento had been watching television in her room on the evening of the attack when Bourne knocked on her door and asked her to come outside.
“He then viciously and brutally attacked her, stabbing her repeatedly with a kitchen knife to her head and her body,” the judge said. “This was without question an utterly terrifying incident for Ms Nascimento. “She was attacked without warning and without provocation in the home in which she lived and worked. It is only through sheer good fortune that she survived the attack.”.
The judge told the court Ms Nascimento has permanent scars which cause her “intense” pain. She also suffers with mental health issues including post-traumatic stress disorder and panic attacks. “Although Ms Nascimento worked for an extremely wealthy family they have offered her no help, no support and nothing but a single text message while she was in hospital,” he added.
The judge said she left her place of work, where she also lived, and has had to rely on charity and the help of others to get by. “This must feel cold, unfeeling and unfair at a very difficult time in her life,” he added. He imposed a hospital order with restrictions, explaining Bourne will remain in a secure hospital “indefinitely”.
“He will not be released unless a specialist tribunal considers it appropriate,” the judge continued. “Were he ever to be released it would be under strict conditions and a high degree of oversight.”. Judge Perrins thanked Ms Nascimento, who was seated in the public gallery, for her courage in attending proceedings, telling her: “I sincerely hope that your physical and mental scars heal and with time you’ll be able to move on from this truly awful incident.”.
Consultant forensic psychiatrist Dr Michael Alcock told the court Bourne, who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, has not responded to treatment so far and that there was “no guarantee” he would ever make a full recovery. Jurors heard previously that Bourne and Ms Nascimento had been the only two people living in the house for around three months before the incident, with the defendant’s mother travelling abroad.
In a statement read out by the prosecutor, Ms Nascimento told of how Bourne knocked on her door and said: “Josey, come outside.”. “He started to attack me with a knife and he didn’t say anything,” she said. “He was holding me by the blouse and he started stabbing my blouse. I was bleeding so much that I was using the blouse to stop the bleeding.
“When he was stabbing me he eventually let go of the knife and started to strangle me around the neck with both hands.”. Ms Nascimento described how she managed to get free and lock herself in a bathroom before retrieving her phone to call for help, telling one of her friends that she was dying.
The court heard she tried to breathe quietly in the hope that Bourne would think she was dead. “He then said: ‘Open the door’, which he repeated and was knocking,” Ms Nascimento continued. “I could feel my blood going down my body. I was losing blood.”.
Describing the attack, she said: “I told him I have a daughter and I pleaded with him to stop. “He told me that it was because I was evil, but we had never had an argument or a disagreement.”. She said Bourne had not been behaving normally in the lead-up to the incident, recounting how he had been sleeping on the bathroom floor and talking to himself, the court heard.
The defendant made a 999 call after the event, giving his name and telling the operator: “There is this demon woman in my house and I stabbed her. “I’m a nice boy from Chelsea. You’re just going to have to please not bring a gun. I do have blood all over me.”.
Bourne also went to his uncle’s house after the incident, telling him from outside the front door: “I’m a good person but I had to stab the maid because she was full of demons.”. Police body worn camera footage recorded him apologising repeatedly after his arrest and telling officers: “It was the devil.”.
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