A TROUBLED son who tried to murder his paedophile father when he went to visit him at a Blackburn care home is today starting an eight-year-and-eight-month jail term.

Preston Crown Court heard Daniel Robert Green tried to strangle his father, David, who has advanced dementia, but when that didn’t work he hit him over the head with a porcelain figurine until it smashed into pieces.

Green told staff at the Ravenswing Manor care home that his attempts to strangle his 77-year-old dad had failed because ‘his hands were too small’ and police later heard him muttering: “I can’t even kill someone right. Pathetic.”

When he was told David had survived the attack, 31-year-old Green told police: “I’m disappointed with my effort, I guess. Well I won’t have to see him any more, will I?”

Prosecuting, Jeremy Grout-Smith said Green arrived at the care home in St Francis Road to visit his father at 3.30pm on March 29 but it wasn’t until 8pm that he carried out the attack.

Mr Grout-Smith said the father and son had been watching TV in the lounge but care assistant Katie Heslop her the victim shout out. She saw Green with a blood-soaked blanket wrapped around his arm.

Mr Grout-Smith said Green told one of Ms Heslop’s colleagues: “I tried to strangle my dad. Obviously it didn’t work.”

When Ms Heslop went to investigate she found David sat in his usual chair covered in blood. She described seeing ‘blood all over the place’.

She called an ambulance and treated David for a head injury until paramedics arrived.

Mr Grout-Smith said: “The victim had been hit over the head with a porcelain statue which was in pieces on the floor around him.

“Mr Green was still wearing his glasses. They were also covered in blood.”

While Heslop was with David, Daniel told her colleague Emma Taylor: “I tried to kill him. Get the police. I tried to kill him.”

Green told a another care worker who was treating him for a cut to the hand: “I just tried to kill him. I tried to strangle him but it didn’t work.”

When police arrived Green told an officer: “I tried to kill him. I tried to strangle him but I only have small hands, , so I hit him repeatedly over the head with a porcelain figure.”

He continued: “He sexually abused children when I was a child. I have not been able to vent my anger with him until now.”

Green told the officer he had not been sexually abused by his father himself.

Mr Grout-Smith said David was hit over the head between three and five times and was treated for one large cut to his forehead, two smaller cuts to the head, and cuts to the forearm and hand. He also had bruising and red marks around the front of his neck.

Green, of no fixed address, who had no previous convictions, pleaded guilty to attempted murder.

Defending, Rachel Woods said many years ago David Green, who her client had lived with, was diagnosed with dementia and Daniel had been his primary carer.

However she said Daniel, who was isolated in the community and had no adult friends, was ill equipped to care for his father, which created an unhealthy relationship between the pair. When he had a fall David was put into the care home, which left Daniel alone and in a property registered in his father’s name.

Ms Woods said days before the incident Green walked out of the property and was living on the streets but developed problems with his feet which he needed hospital treatment for. After being discharged he walked past his old high school, which stirred up old memories.

However Ms Woods said her client had only gone to see her father to get a hot meal, a hot drink and a roof over his head and had not gone there with the intention of killing him.

She said: “This was a tragic case for all concerned. It was clearly a spontaneous act. An act which was committed against a background of frustration and resentment towards Mr Green’s father. There hadn’t been any planning.”

Sentencing Green, Judge Mark Brown said he accepted a probation officer’s assessment that the defendant posed a low-risk to the public.

Judge Brown said: “You have harboured over many years a resentment to your father for sexually abusing two children. Your father received a custodial sentence for those offences when you were 13. These offences destroyed the adulation you had for him and you harboured a resentment for a long time.

“The anger increased and manifested itself in the attack on him. It does seem this was an isolated incident.”

After the hearing, Det Con Rachel Norris, of Blackburn CID, said: “It was only thanks to the quick intervention from staff which prevented a more serious outcome.

“I would like to offer my appreciation to those workers who acted with ultimate calm and professionalism in unexpected and unforeseen circumstances.”