A 23-year-old student has been jailed for life after stabbing his housemate 30 times in a premeditated attack sparked by a rent dispute. Zack Coughlan will serve a minimum of 28 years before he can be considered for parole, meaning he will be 51 before release is possible.
Attack and Aftermath
Coughlan ambushed Jamie Collins, 21, in the garden of their home in Filton, South Gloucestershire, shortly before 6pm on April 8. He was dressed in all black and wore a mask and gloves as he waited for Collins to return from the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol). After the attack, Coughlan left Collins to die in an alleyway at the back of the house and cycled away on his victim's bike.
He dumped the bicycle at a nearby retail park, where he bought a change of clothes and threw his bloodstained clothing in a pond in a bag weighed with stones. He then returned to the £300,000 house on Cleve Road, which he owned, ate a pizza, and played online games with friends, saying he "had to disconnect" from the killing.
Investigation and Plea
Coughlan was captured on a CCTV camera he had installed, which shows him going into the garden with a torch at 2.06am and calling 999 a minute later to report his friend had been stabbed. Initially treated as a witness, he provided officers with CCTV footage of the attack, which he watched five times, Bristol Crown Court heard.
Coughlan had denied the charge and was due to stand trial, but he changed his plea to guilty for one count of murder yesterday. His partial defence of manslaughter by reason of loss of control could not be left to the jury, according to Mr Justice Linden. Prosecutor Adam Vaitilingam KC previously told the jury: "This was a carefully planned and cold-blooded execution."
Background and Motive
The court heard that Coughlan and Collins, both final-year robotics students, had disagreed about rent and politics. The house was bought by Coughlan after his mother, who worked for Apple, lent him £300,000. Charlie Latimer, a third housemate, said he and Collins had been paying £650 per month, later reduced to £500, and then only contributing towards bills.
Coughlan told jurors he feared Collins was going to kill him after the disputes, claiming his housemate "had a kitchen knife in his hand and he told me he wanted to kill me" on April 7. The day of the murder, Coughlan asked if Collins meant what he said, and Collins said yes. Coughlan testified he saw "no other way to protect" himself but "never wanted to hurt anyone".
Collins was described as "very left-wing" and critical of large multi-national corporations, wealthy individuals, and landlords. Coughlan told the jury he experienced violence from his father while growing up and was a "high achiever" expecting to graduate with a first-class degree. He is half Danish and grew up in Cork, Ireland, before studying robotics in Bristol at age 19.
In a statement released after Collins' death, his family said: "Our Jamie was a bright, kind, gentle and unassuming young man with his whole life ahead of him. He was looking forward to finishing his uni journey and planning to come home to us in Swansea in just a few weeks' time." They added: "Our family has been sickened that Zack Coughlan pretended to help Jamie when in fact he is responsible for killing him."
