Killer’s sentence is welcomed

Caspers Stamers, aged 30, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and received 12 years imprisonment.

Police hope the sentencing provides some small degree of comfort to Ksenjia’s family.

Ksenjia died following a stabbing in the Warren Grove area of Lisburn on May 28 2012.

Jailing 29-year-old Kaspars Stamers at Craigavon Crown Court, sitting in Belfast, Mr Justice Weir warned him that even when he has served the minimum period of 12 years, it will be up to the parole commissioners whether to release him or not and that if he breached any of the lifelong licence conditions, he would be jailed again.

Last March Stamers pleaded guilty to murdering his girlfriend, Ksenija.

Mr Justice Weir said while the exact circumstances of how she came to suffer multiple stab wounds were unclear, Stamers had no real option but to plead guilty to the killing “having been seen literally, with your victims blood on your hands”.

Ksenija, who worked as an embroidery stitcher at a local factory, had been dropped off at the home the pair shared at Warren Grove in Lisburn by her office manager at around 5.30pm.

The judge said it was his view that what was likely to have happened was that Ksenija, whom he described as hard working and popular with her colleagues, came home to find Stamers drunk and an argument ensued during which he went into the kitchen, grabbed the knife and stabbed her multiple times.

He revealed that a post-mortem examination found a total of 12 stab wounds and six incised wounds to Ksenija’s chest, back, stomach and arms.