Man jailed for alcohol and drug-fuelled knife attack on partner and two others
A man has received a partially-suspended ten-year prison sentence for a knife attack on a man during which he eviscerated the victim.
Judge Pauline Codd said that Lawrence Mubango (20) attacked his two friends during a drink and cocaine-fuelled frenzy of paranoia and jealousy.
The three men were drinking at the Dublin home of Mubango's partner, while she was in bed sleeping with their baby.
Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that paramedics arrived to find the victim, Ashley Ncube, eviscerated, with multiple loops of bowel and intestines protruding from his stomach.
Mubango told gardaí that he believed the two men were going to try to rape his partner and he was trying to protect her. Judge Codd said there was no substance to this belief and said Mubango was not acting in self-defence.
Mubango, formerly of Parknoe House, Tyrone Court, Inchicore, Dublin pleaded guilty to assault causing serious harm to Mr Ncube at Parknoe House on May 17, 2018. He also admitted assault causing harm to Nhlanhla Nduli.
The court heard that the three men were consuming drinking, smoking cannabis and taking cocaine in the apartment. Mubango became paranoid and at one point began asking one of the men if he had tried to sleep with his partner.
He began punching the two men and they left. Mubango armed himself with a kitchen knife and followed the men out into a public corridor where he stabbed Mr Nduli in the chest.
He then stabbed Ncube who dropped to the floor. Mubango stood over the victim stabbing him even as Mr Ncube held his hands up asking the attacker to stop, Judge Codd said.
She commended Mr Nduli who, despite his own injuries, cradled Mr Ncube and was trying to apply pressure to the stomach injury.
Mr Ncube tried to pick himself up but kept falling. The two victims asked Mubango to get help but Mubango told them to “fuck off” and poured a bottle of 7-Up over them.
Mubango's partner ran to a neighbouring flat and asked to be let in, saying “he has a knife”. Mubango left and the alarm was raised. Gardaí arrested Mubango at a nearby Luas stop shortly afterwards.
He told them he had stabbed the two men and said he was acting in self-defence but had gone too far. He repeatedly said, “I'm sorry.”
Judge Codd said the three men were all “out of their heads” on drugs and alcohol and that Mubango acted impulsively in a fit of jealousy and paranoia. At one stage, before the knife attacks, he threatened to jump off the balcony until his partner talked him out of doing that.
Judge Codd suspended the last 18 months of a ten-year sentence on condition that Mubango undergoes drugs and alcohol rehabilitation.
She noted that Mr Ncube was stabbed in the liver and continued to suffer with issues from this injury and may need a liver transplant. The 24-year-old was previously involved in martial arts but now had difficulties with mobility and breathing and struggled to walk upstairs.
Mr Nduli was stabbed in the chest and needed medical treatment though his injuries were less severe. He said he was psychologically affected by the memory of the gardaí, who had arrived in response to the emergency call, pointing guns at him.
Mubango has previous convictions for assault, unlawful possession of knives and robbery. A father-of-two, he was unemployed at the time of the offences but previously worked as an apprentice panel beater.
The sentence was backdated to May 24, 2018 when he went into custody. He was on bail at the time of this offending.
