Central News, Press Room, Central Criminal Court,

Central News, Press Room, Central Criminal Court, Old Bailey, LONDON, EC4.

Tel: 020 7236 0116.

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eMail: news@centralnews.

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centralnews.

co.

uk
01 June 2000

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In a statement to police, Strang’s wife Michelle, now 28, told of the horrifying events leading up to the bloodbath.

She said her husband’s behaviour had become increasingly odd, and on one terrifying occasion he tried to submerge their nine-year-old daughter Olivia’s head under water.

Michelle said: ‘He had a basin full of water, and when I asked what he was doing he said it had to be done properly.

Her whole head was submerged.

‘He said ”That’s how Satan does it”.

He made me do it.

I tried but we were both screaming, and I couldn’t.

‘On November 28, he got up about 8am.

I asked him what he was doing today, and he never spoke to me.

Then he said he was going to work on his computer.

‘Around 10.

30am, I heard the front door open and Eden went out.

I ran to the living room window and I saw he had only a t-shirt on, but then he took it off.

‘He started to walk in the direction of the church.

I couldn’t see his hands.

‘He had locked me in, and I had to unlock the door.

I ran out, and there was a woman saying ”Quick, phone the police, there is a madman slashing people with a sword”.

I knew it was Eden, and I ran into the house.

‘I was shaking and felt sick.

I picked up the phone but it was dead, and I noticed that Eden had cut the wires.

‘

Strang was born in Glasgow and lived there until November 1994.

His natural father died when he was a young boy and his stepfather was a drug dealer and heroin addict who died of an overdose in front of him when he was ten.

His mother, who lived in North Side Road, Glasgow, was also a junkie, and died of AIDS three years after his stepdad.

Michelle met Strang when she was 15 and he was studying at the Royal College of Commerce.

Four years later she became pregnant with their daughter Olivia.

Strang went to Paisley University where he studied business and information technology, but said he found university life hard because of racism.

The court heard racist thugs had stabbed Strang on three occasions – once in the back when he collected money from a cashpoint machine.

During his time with Michelle, Strang started to take an interest in the bible and the Koran and ‘would make all sorts of accusations,’ his wife told police.

But he managed to get a telesales job and then employment installing computers.

The couple married on May 10 1996 at Brixton Registry Office.

Two days before he had been thrown out of his aunt’s house because of his deteriorating mental health.

Michelle only lived with her husband for a week before going back to Glasgow, but returned to London on September 20 when Strang was given a council flat.

He told his wife that he used ‘Master’ and ‘Slave’ computers and colleagues would insultingly write his name next to ‘Slave.

‘

‘He would say they were all at it but he would not say what ‘it’ was,’ Michelle recalled.

By June 30 of last year, Strang had been promoted to the post of IT consultant, but was made redundant.

‘He believed he knew too much.

He was highly intelligent, and black people should not know too much,’ Michelle said.

Strang would work though the night on his computer, hoping to design a successful website.

Michelle said she was with him when he bought the samurai sword from London’s Chinatown.

‘He chose one he liked for pnds stlg 110.

He paid this in cash,’ Michelle said.

But as his illness worsened, Strang became convinced that Michelle was one of the many devil worshippers out to get him.

He told her he wanted to ‘get her away from this life’, would pace from room to room in the house, and would talk about Judgment Day.

Just two days before the church rampage, two neighbours came to visit, but Strang locked the doors, turned the lights off, and grabbed a kitchen knife.

Michelle said: ‘He was holding the knife and looking out of the door, and pacing up and down.

‘He would read scriptures to himself, and wouldn’t talk to me.

For the last two weeks, he wouldn’t communicate with me at all.

He said money was Satan’s.

‘He would lie about in bed all day reading the Bible, and would walk about saying ‘Shh’ all the time.

He would say ”You’re one of them”.

‘I used to pray with him to try to help him.

But it was as though he believed he was sane and we were all mad.

‘

ends