Ursula and Sabina Eriksson

Ursula Eriksson and Sabina Eriksson(born 3 November 1967) areSwedishtwinsisters who came to national attention in theUnited Kingdomin May 2008. They had been inIrelandbefore travelling to the UK and boarding abusforLondoninLiverpool. Their odd behaviour after exiting the bus at a service station on theM6 motorwaycaused the driver to not allow them back on board. The two were later seen on thecentral reservationof the M6 motorway. WhenHighways Englandtraffic officers arrived to assist the women, they ran across the busy motorway, as captured by a small television crew. Ursula managed to dodge traffic, but Sabina was knocked over. Shortly after police arrived, the women again dashed onto the motorway and were struck by oncoming vehicles. Ursula suffered serious injuries, and when Sabina regained consciousness, she refused medical aid and attacked a police officer, at which point she was arrested and sedated.
Appearing calm, though behaving unusually, Sabina was processed by police inStoke-on-Trentand was later released from custody. Shortly afterwards, she was seen and taken in by Glenn Hollinshead, ofFenton,Staffordshire, whom she suddenly stabbed to death the next day. Sabina was then pursued running from the scene and arrested in hospital after jumping from a bridge onto a busytrunk road. Despite these incidents, there was no evidence that drugs or alcohol were involved in the incidents on the M6 or the killing of Hollinshead.Sabina later pleaded guilty tomanslaughterwithdiminished responsibility, after an apparent episode offolie à deux(or "shared psychosis"), a rarepsychiatricdisorder in whichdelusionalbeliefs aretransmitted from one individual to another. As identical twins sharing thesame genetic makeupthe chances of such a psychiatric disorders may be increased. Ursula was released from the hospital after recovering and now lives inBellevue, Washington, US, but Sabina was sentenced to five years imprisonment and released onparolein 2011 before returning toSweden.
Sabina Eriksson and heridentical twinsister Ursula Eriksson were born in Sweden on 3 November 1967 and grew up inSunne,Värmland, with an older sister and an older brother.In their youth they had no apparent history of mental health issues or criminal convictions, and by 2000, Ursula was living in theUnited Stateswhile Sabina was living inMallow,County Cork,Ireland, with her spouse and two children.
Ursula visited Sabina on Friday, 16 May 2008. For unclear reasons, the sisters secretly departed Sabina's home forLiverpool,England.Probably travelling byferry, they arrived in Liverpool at 8:30 am on Saturday, and went to St Anne Street Police Station, apparently to report concerns over the safety of Sabina's children.Liverpool Police contactedDublinto follow up the request, learning that Sabina had fought with her partner the previous night.At around 11:30 am that morning, the pair then boarded aNational Expresscoachheaded toLondon.
A police report stated that the sisters suddenly disembarked from the bus atKeele services, amotorway service station, as they were not feeling well.The driver of the bus, however, said he left them at Keele services,although it was not a scheduled rest stop,at around 1:00 pm after becoming suspicious of their erratic behaviour. He noticed the twins clinging to their bags tightly and did not let them re-board because they refused to let him search their bags for illegal items. The manager of the service station was informed, and also, feeling suspicious of the pair's demeanour, movements, and fixation on their bags, she called the police. Officers arrived to talk to them but left after saying the women seemed harmless.
As seen onclosed-circuit televisioncameras, the pair departed the services on foot and began to walk down the central reservation of the M6 before attempting to cross it, causing chaos to the traffic and picking up minor injuries in the attempt – Sabina having been struck by aSEAT León. Their older brother claimed in a Swedish newspaper that his sisters were fleeing from maniacs who were chasing them,although there is nothing to support this.Highways Agencyofficers responded to the incident, and police from theCentral Motorway Police Groupwere called to assist. The police were accompanied by a small television crew who happened to be filmingMotorway Copswith the officers. Standing on the north directionhard shoulderof the motorway, the police were being appraised of the situation when, without warning, Ursula broke free and ran into the side of an oncomingMercedes-Benz Actros2546articulated lorrytravelling at around 56 mph (90 km/h).Sabina then quickly followed her into the road and was hit head-on by aVolkswagen Polotravelling at high speed.
Both survived. Ursula was immobilised as the lorry had crushed her legs, and Sabina spent fifteen minutes unconscious.The pair were treated by paramedics; however, Ursula resisted medical aid by spitting, scratching, and screaming. Ursula told the police officers restraining her, "I recognise you – I know you're not real", and Sabina, now conscious, shouted "They're going to steal your organs".To the surprise of the police, Sabina got to her feet, despite attempts from police officers Tracy Cope and Paul Finlayson to persuade her to stay on the ground.Sabina started screaming for help and calling for the police although they were present,then struck Officer Cope's face before running into traffic on the other side of the motorway. Emergency workers and several members of the public caught up with her and restrained her, and carried her to a waiting ambulance, at which point she was handcuffed and sedated. Given the similarities in their behaviours, a suicide pact or drug use was quickly suspected.
Ursula was taken to hospital by air ambulance. Sabina was taken to hospital where, despite her ordeal and an apparent lack of concern over her sister's injuries, she soon became calmer and was released five hours later.In police custody, she remained relaxed, and while being processed, she told an officer, "We say in Sweden that an accident rarely comes alone. Usually, at least one more follows – maybe two."On 19 May 2008, Sabina was released from court without a full psychiatric evaluation, having pleaded guilty to the charges of trespass on the motorway and hitting a police officer.The court sentenced her to one day in custody, which she had been deemed to have served, having spent a full night in police custody.
Leaving court, Sabina began to wander the streets ofStoke-on-Trent, trying to locate her sister in hospital and carrying her possessions in a clear plastic bag the police had given her.She wore her sister's green top.At 7:00 pm, two local men spotted Sabina while walking their dog on Christchurch Street,Fenton.One of the men was 54-year-old Glenn Hollinshead, a self-employed welder, qualified paramedic, and formerRAFairman,and the other was his friend, Peter Molloy. Sabina appeared friendly and stroked the dog as the three struck up a conversation.Although friendly, Sabina appeared to be behaving nervously, which worried Molloy.Sabina asked the two men for directions to any nearbybed and breakfastsor hotels.
Hollinshead took pity on her and offered to take her back to his house on Duke Street. Sabina accepted and relaxed as she began to relate how she was trying to locate her hospitalised sister. Back at the house, over drinks, her odd behaviour continued as she constantly got up and looked out of the window, leading Molloy to assume that she had run away from an abusive partner.She appearedparanoidtoo, offering the men cigarettes, only to quickly snatch them out of their mouths, claiming they may be poisoned.Shortly before midnight, Molloy left, and Sabina stayed the night.
The next day around midday,Hollinshead called his brother regarding local hospitals to locate Sabina's sister Ursula.At 7:40 pm, while a meal was being prepared, Hollinshead left the house to ask a neighbour, Frank Booth, for tea bags, then went back inside.One minute later, he staggered back outside, now bleeding, and told him "She stabbed me", before collapsing to the ground and quickly dying from his injuries. His last words before he died, allegedly, were, "Look after my dog for me."
As Booth dialled999, Sabina fled the premises,and was caught on the run by nearby CCTV. She ran out of the house with a hammer, periodically hitting herself over the head with it.A passing motorist, Joshua Grattage, saw this and decided to tackle her to take control of the hammer.While wrestling with him, Sabina screamed, took a roof tile out of her pocket, and struck him on the back of the head with it, stunning him temporarily. By this time, paramedics had found her, and they gave chase. The pursuit ended atHeron Crosswhen Sabina jumped from a 12-metre (40 ft) high bridge onto theA50.Breaking both ankles and fracturing her skull in the fall,she was taken to hospital.
On 6 June 2008, Sabina was arrested while recovering atUniversity Hospital of North Staffordshire,and was discharged in awheelchairon 11 September 2008, at which point she was taken into custody and charged with murder the same day.Ursula was also released from hospital in September, and relocated uneventfully back to Sweden, and then the US.The trial was scheduled for February 2009,but was adjourned after the court encountered difficulties in obtaining her medical records from Sweden.The trial was then scheduled to start on 1 September 2009.
Sabinapled guiltytomanslaughterwithdiminished responsibilityon 2 September 2009,having stabbed her victim five times with a kitchen knife.At no point during her interrogation or the trial did she explain her actions, only replying "no comment" to extensive police questioning. Similarly, at no time was the video from the M6 used as evidence in the court.Both theprosecutionand the defence claimed that Sabina wasinsaneat the time of the killing. However, she had becomesaneagain by the time of her trial.Thedefence counselin the trial claimed that Eriksson was a "secondary" sufferer offolie à deux, influenced by the presence or perceived presence of her twin sister, the "primary" sufferer. The court also heard that she had suffered from a rare psychiatric disorder which made her hear voices, but she could not interpret what they said,as well as an alternative theory that she had suffered from acute polymorphicdelusional disorder.Her plea was accepted by the prosecution atNottingham Crown Courton 2 September 2010.Justice Saunders concluded that Sabina had a "low" level of culpability for her actions:
Sabina was sentenced to five years in prison. She was sent toBronzefield Women's Prison,where she turned to Christianity.Having already spent 439 days in custody before sentencing,this left her first eligible for release in 2011.
Many questions were left unanswered. Some called for an investigation into the way the criminal justice system handled the matter, including Peter Molloy andMPforStoke SouthRob Flello.Glenn Hollinshead's brother Garry was critical of the justice system which he viewed as enabling the murder, stating:
In 2012, a section edited from theMotorway Copsepisode was uploaded toYouTube. It shows police officers at the roadside after Ursula had been run over, discussing detaining and assessing Sabina on mental health grounds - which may have prevented Hollinshead's murder - but this was not done.