A woman with schizophrenia hammered her mother to death while her elder brother was out seeking medical advice for her, the Court of First Instance heard yesterday.
Leung Ching-han, 49, pleaded not guilty to murder, but admitted hammering her 79-year-old mother, Tsui Shuet-ching, to death at their home at Lok Man Sun Chuen, Hung Hom, on May 5, 2009. She disputed the cause of the killing.
Leung, her brother Leung Kwok-choi and their mother all suffered from schizophrenia, prosecutor Walter Lau said.
The defendant had been in and out of psychiatric centres and was discharged in early 2009. She had stopped taking medicine two weeks before the killing.
'If I had known that such a tragedy would happen I'd never have chosen to leave home that morning,' Leung Kwok-choi said.
On the day of the killing, Leung Kwok-choi was concerned about his sister's condition and went to Kowloon Psychiatric Clinic to seek a doctor's advice.
He had noticed two weeks earlier that his sister's condition was deteriorating.