Australian killer Jemma Mitchell’s mum says she’s ‘no killer’, was ‘broken-hearted’ and used by men
Jemma Mitchell - the Aussie osteopath that decapitated and stuffed her friend’s body in a suitcase in London - had embraced faith after heartbreak, her mum says. Watch the video.
Crime in Focus
Don't miss out on the headlines from Crime in Focus. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Exclusive: The mother of an Australian osteopath who murdered and then decapitated her friend for her million-dollar estate said she was “erratic” and broken-hearted after breaking up with her Melbourne tradie boyfriend and let “hundreds of men use her for sex”.
Hilary Collard, whose “broken-hearted” daughter Jemma Mitchell moved back home to England from Melbourne after splitting with her partner, said she had “turned to God” – and was no killer.
Mitchell, 38, will spend the rest of her life behind bars for chopping up her church-going divorcee victim Mee Kuen Chong, stuffing her body into a blue suitcase and dumping her remains on a beach in Devon, southwest England.
“Jemma’s no killer, she’s a loving, kind daughter; when her boyfriend dumped her, she came to be with me in London, we did everything together, she loved me so much she said we’d die together,” Ms Collard, 74, said.
Watch the exclusive video above where Jemma’s mother defends her daughter.
“She had hundreds of boyfriends, they all used her for sex – but the last one she loved, he was lovely, very religious, he never slept with her, that’s why she fell for him.
“When it ended, she hit rock bottom, she was erratic, she turned to God, because he went to church.”
Ms Collard said her daughter’s biggest mistake was to “wash the suitcase” which she claims
Ms Chong — her 67-year-old “friend” — had asked her to pack with her household belongings.
“She was not motivated by money to kill, she had a home in Queensland (Helensvale) and was getting rent.
“Silly girl, she’s really, really bright but she messed up, she washed the blue suitcase so the police think she killed,” Ms Collard said.
“I won’t believe she is capable of murder – how can you put an entire body in a suitcase?”
Fighting back tears in the front room of the six-bedroom dilapidated home she shared with Mitchell in northwest London, Ms Collard said: “I’m old, Jemma’s all I’ve got.
“Who will help me fix this house now she’s gone? I can’t leave it another 30 years, Jemma sorted out the building work.”
Mitchell’s mother, a personal assistant for the British Foreign Office, had transferred the family home into her name in September 2021 to avoid inheritance tax.
Her mother wanted a third floor built and a new roof but they were ripped off £130,000 ($232,335) by rogue builders.
Ms Collard said when Mitchell’s numerous relationships failed, she made her mother and the London family home — passed down from her grandmother Iris Huntley — her focus, moving back to London in 2015.
“Jemma and I were one, we adored each other and do not know how we’re going to live without each other – she’s got 34 years,” Ms Collard said.
“She adored her grandmother so much she would wash her feet in a bowl.
“I told Jemma I won’t live to 110 without you. She said, ‘yes you will mum.’
“She said she’d look after me to the end even if she was on her hands and knees.”
Mitchell, a self-styled healer, was found guilty in October of murdering Ms Chong for money to repair the family home and sentenced to life, or 34 years, at Bronzefield Prison in Surrey, southwest of London.
An Old Bailey jury heard Melbourne-born Mitchell hatched an “evil” plot to kill the victim at her home in Willesden, more than 6km from where she and her mother lived, when she failed to persuade Ms Chong to loan her £200,000 ($A357,313) to pay for renovations to the £4 million ($A7m) family home.
Court documents state Ms Chong, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, had a habit of offering to leave her home to others after her death.
When Ms Chong backed out, Mitchell battered her to death and faked her will to inherit the bulk of her estate worth more than £700,000 ($A1.24m).
She hit the woman with a blunt instrument, fracturing her ribs 20 times, and severed her head beneath the third cervical vertebrae on June 11, 2021.
Mitchell continued attending Emmanuel Evangelical Church in north London — where she and Ms Chong met in August 2020 — for three-and-a-half weeks after the murder.
CCTV footage showed Mitchell arriving at Ms Chong’s semi-detached home with a large blue suitcase containing a murder kit. She left four hours later with the same, bulkier case and was seen struggling to wheel it.
She also had a smaller bag full of Ms Chong’s financial documents and land registry papers, which were later recovered from Mitchell’s home.
Footage showed she had wheeled the pensioner’s body for two hours across London and stored it in the garden of her rubbish-strewn home for 15 days.
She then drove 300km with the body in the boot of a hired Volvo to the resort town of Salcombe, where the headless corpse washed up ashore on June 26. A few days later on July 1, the head was discovered, 10m from the body beneath undergrowth.
The trial heard that Mitchell had learnt how to dissect a human body while studying Human Sciences at King’s College London, where she received a first-class degree and was awarded the Hamilton Prize for “anatomical excellence”.
The blue suitcase was later found on top of Mitchell’s neighbour’s shed with a bloodstained tea towel in a pocket with Ms Chong’s DNA on it. No other DNA profiles could be obtained.
Police arrested Mitchell on July 6 and found a 2021 wall calendar with an entry written for June 26, the day she drove to Salcombe, in two different inks.
It read: “8am collect body back C letter will copy 2 hr walk.”
In a box in the bedroom was a copy of Mitchell’s will, written in 2017, and a faked one from the victim bequeathing 95 per cent of the deceased’s estate to Mitchell for building works and the rest to her mother.
Booklets were found, entitled “A Helping Hand to Write Your Will” and “Your Guide to Writing a Legally Binding Will”.
Lead investigator Detective Chief Inspector Jim Eastwood said unemployed Mitchell had never claimed responsibility for murdering Ms Chong, also known as Deborah.
“She was so desperate to obtain the money she needed to complete the renovations on her house she took advantage of Deborah’s good will,” he said.
More Coverage
Originally published as Australian killer Jemma Mitchell’s mum says she’s ‘no killer’, was ‘broken-hearted’ and used by men
New law to block legal challenge to AN0M sting
New laws will prevent any legal challenge to one of Australia’s most successful covert stings in organised crime using the encrypted AN0M application.
Read more
How Assange’s father is derailing his chance of a pardon
Australia spent significant political capital to get Julian Assange out of prison while the US attempted to extradite him on spying charges — but now his father has intervened.
Read more