A LAS LOMAS man who killed his pregnant mother in a frenzied knife attack has been ordered to serve a remaining sentence of just over nine years in prison, after the High Court accepted a plea agreement that reduced the charge from murder to manslaughter.

Michael Joseph, now 25, was originally assessed at a starting point of 27 years’ imprisonment for manslaughter. That sentence was reduced following mitigation, a discount for his early guilty plea, and credit for more than six-and-a-half years already spent on remand, leaving him with nine years, one month and 29 days still to serve.

The sentence was imposed on Wednesday by Justice Sherene Murray-Bailey, who accepted that Joseph had acted under provocation linked to longstanding psychological trauma stemming from his childhood.