Woman convicted of stabbing couple in Port Glasgow attack

Sandra McKillop, 46, knifed a man and a woman at an address on Taransay Way – assaulting her female victim to severe injury.

The targeted couple sustained several wounds as a result of McKillop's violent onslaught, with the woman suffering a collapsed lung.

McKillop was found guilty of the double atack by a jury at Greenock Sheriff Court, who heard evidence both victims, police witnesses and a forensic expert.

The jury was told that she had arrived at the property uninvited between midnight and 1am on July 21, 2022.

(Image: Newsquest)

The man McKillop attacked said he had been in the living room when he heard ‘banging and shouting’ from outside the patio doors.

He went to the garden to tell her to ‘beat it’ and saw her with a ‘dark blade’ before being stabbed to the left side of his stomach.

The witness described seeing McKillop run over to his partner making a stabbing motion and then hearing screams.

He told jurors: “She stabbed me and nearly killed my partner.”

In her evidence, the woman said that the incident happened ‘very fast’ and that she remembered ‘feeling the wetness of blood’.

A forensic scientist told the court that McKillop’s DNA was found on the handle of a knife which was discovered in the garden after the incident, with both victims’ DNA being found on the blade.

The male witness also described striking McKillop with a plank of wood in the wake of the stabbings before she ran up the side of the house and away from the area.

(Image: Newsquest)

In her closing remarks, fiscal depute Maria Murdoch said: “It was Sandra McKillop who attended uninvited.

“She only left because she had been hit with a plank of wood.

“Her story is not in line with DNA evident in this case.

“If you decide to convict Sandra McKillop, I respectfully submit that you will feel confident in that decision.”

Defence solicitor Aidan Gallagher said his client had been the victim in the situation, and that she had attended the property to collect a mobile phone.

He agreed that a ‘brutal and sustained attack’ had taken place, but that it was an attack on McKillop.

She lodges a special defence of self defence, claiming she had been hit by the man first – before being attacked by the couple together.

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In her evidence, she told the jury she found the knife lying in the garden and used it to fend them off.

A police witness said a blood trail had been followed along the side of the house, along Taransay Way and across Kilmacolm Road to Marloch Avenue – a distance of around half a mile.

Mr Gallagher said: “Sandra McKillop was frank in what she told you. She accepts that she picked up the knife.

“She accepts that in the heat of the moment she started to fend off the attack that was being perpetrated upon her.

“This has happened and was over in a flash. It was not a slow moving event.

Greenock Sheriff Court (Image: Newsquest)

“She was under attack, she was fleeing for her life and she did what she could.

“She was not up for a fight, she was up for a phone.”

The jury of seven men and eight women took less than two hours to reach the majority verdict on both assault charges.

McKillop, of the Inverclyde Centre, was also accused of shouting, swearing and uttering threats of violence towards the victims, as well as being in possession of a bladed weapon on Taransay Way without reasonable excuse or lawful authority.

Jurors reached a unanimous not proven verdict on both of these allegations.

Sheriff Sheena Fraser deferred sentence to allow for the preparation of reports, with McKillop due to return to court on July 18.