Son Who Collected Chucky Dolls Beat Father to Death With Hammer Days After Mental Health Plea Was Ignored

A 20-year-old man who beat his father to death with a hammer and attacked his mother and younger brother in their Brighton home had been suffering hallucinations about killing people, Lewes Crown Court heard on 12 February.

Fabio Botros pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of Emad Samir Botros Farag, 57, along with wounding his mother with intent and attempting to cause grievous bodily harm to an 11-year-old boy. He was handed an indefinite hospital order.

The court was told Fabio Botros believed the people he killed in his hallucinations 'would be brought back to life.' He collected Chucky dolls from the Child's Play series, in which a possessed doll murders people.

Emad Samir Botros, his father, a Deliveroo driver and deacon at the St Mary and St Abraam Coptic Orthodox Church in Hove, died from catastrophic head injuries at the family home on Hartfield Avenue, Hollingbury, on 1 April 2025.

Neighbours had called emergency services after hearing screaming shortly after 7am.

How an Argument Over Baggage Turned Fatal

Ryan Richter, prosecuting officer, told the court that the family had been waiting for a taxi to the airport that morning. They were due to fly to Egypt for a holiday.

An argument broke out between Fabio Botros and his father over baggage allowance. What happened next was sudden and savage.

Fabio Botros grabbed his father by the throat and struck him over the head with a hammer, the court heard. Screams came from the kitchen. When his mother tried to intervene, Fabio Botros opened a drawer, took out a large kitchen knife and stabbed her in the face. She suffered a fractured skull. The 11-year-old brother was hit on the head with the same hammer.

Police arrived to find Emad Botros Farag inside the property with wounds he would not survive. Officers arrested Fabio Botros close to the address and recovered two knives and a hammer.

His mother and brother were treated at the scene and taken to the hospital. Both were discharged within days. The physical injuries healed. Everything else is harder to measure.

The Medication Switch the Judge Called 'Cruel'

What emerged during sentencing was not simply a story of sudden violence. It was a slow-motion failure of psychiatric care stretching back more than a year.

The court heard that Fabio Botros had been treated as an inpatient in psychiatric hospitals at least twice before the attack. In January 2024, a social worker reported that he 'looked vacant and asked her to help him end his life'. He was detained at Eastbourne psychiatric hospital and put on anti-psychotic medication.

By May 2024, the family noticed a significant improvement. The medication appeared to be working.

Then, in autumn 2024, his treatment team changed course. Believing his difficulties were caused by autism and depression rather than psychosis, they substantially reduced the anti-psychotic dose and switched him to antidepressants.

Judge Christine Laing KC did not hide her view. 'It is a cruel aspect of this case that the anti-psychotic medication was substantially reduced as those treating him thought his difficulties might be due to autism and depression,' she said.

Consultant psychiatrist Dr Michael Kavuma subsequently confirmed the diagnosis that had been missed: paranoid schizophrenia.

Days before the killing, Fabio Botros's father had begged for an urgent psychiatric assessment. His son was seen on 18 March and again on 20 March 2025, the court was told.

No further action was taken.

What the Chucky Obsession Meant — and What It Did Not

The Chucky doll collection made the headlines. It was always going to. A young man obsessed with a fictional killer doll who then kills his own father — the tabloid geometry writes itself.

But the court heard something more disturbing than a horror-film fixation. Fabio Botros was experiencing psychotic hallucinations in which he killed people and believed they would return to life. That is not a fascination with fiction. That is a man whose grip on reality had collapsed, and whose treatment team had, in the judge's words, misread the cause.

Prosecutors contextualised the Chucky obsession during proceedings. They did not claim it caused the violence. The hallucinations, the deteriorating psychiatric condition and the medication reduction carried the clinical weight.

Insp Mark Cullimore of Sussex Police said: 'This was a shocking and tragic incident, and our thoughts are with those affected and their loved ones.'

What Happens Now

Fabio Botros, now 20, will remain under psychiatric care indefinitely. The hospital order means he cannot be released without the approval of a mental health tribunal. He will be held in a secure psychiatric facility, not a prison.

The case has prompted difficult questions about how psychotic illness is identified in young people, how medication decisions are reviewed, and what happens when families plead for help and the system does not respond in time.

On the morning Emad Samir Botros died, he was packing for a family holiday. His son had been assessed by professionals 12 days earlier. Nobody intervened.

The sentencing took place at Lewes Crown Court on 12 February 2026. Sussex Police said the investigation is now closed.