A grandmother was at home when she received a distressing call from her grandson, whose speech was so confused and garbled that she immediately sensed something was terribly wrong.
She implored him to seek help, but the full extent of the tragedy didn’t become clear until days later when a police officer arrived at her door with heartbreaking news: Her daughter had been killed, and it was her grandson who stood accused of the murder.
Stephen Ball, 32, would admit to the unlawful killing of his mother, Susanne Galvin, 55, on the grounds of diminished responsibility. His mental health issues were thrust into the spotlight during his trial at Bolton Crown Court, where jurors ultimately convicted him of murder.
During the trial, his grandmother, Mary Galvin, laid bare the harrowing impact and disturbing consequences of mental health struggles within the family. “As far as I was concerned, both Stephen and Susanne were mentally unstable,” she disclosed.
Susanne Galvin had endured years of mental health problems, initially linked to alcohol and later dementia, according to her mother. “She had no recollection of recent times, everything was back to 30 years ago,” Mary recounted.
Mary had taken on the role of caregiver for her grandsons, Stephen and Michael, over the years, even securing a residential order for them through the family court. Despite being a tight-knit family, Mary observed that Michael ‘didn’t have a lot of time for his mum’ but was vigilant in supporting Stephen whenever he needed it, reports the Manchester Evening News.
Stephen’s ADHD diagnosis came in his teens, but his mum Susanne refused to let him take medication, and his mental health issues persisted. He struggled to focus at school, instead channeling his energy into sports like running and boxing.
Meanwhile, Susanne battled her own personal demons. When Stephen turned 18, he started taking drugs, despite his grandmother Mary’s warnings that they “weren’t good for his brain”.
He once told her, “You know nan, when I take drugs, it makes me feel normal.”
A devastating loss struck in 2018 when Michael, Stephen’s older brother, passed away. Stephen’s substance abuse escalated as he struggled to cope with the loss.
He remained in close contact with his grandmother, speaking with her daily, and she would visit the UK several times a year. However, his relationship with Susanne continued to deteriorate.
Her health was declining, and the pair’s arguments intensified. “They would argue between themselves,” Mary recalled.
“She was very aggressive, she would scream and shout. He was erratic, he was taking drugs and drinking alcohol.”
Stephen’s mum revealed that his father had approached the police due to concerns about his son’s mental health. He suggested that Stephen should be sectioned, but after ‘passing the tests’, mental health teams deemed it appropriate for him to stay within the community, according to Mary.
A week prior to Susanne’s death, Mary paid them a visit. “I spent a week with them,” she shared.
“They weren’t too bad but she had deteriorated quite a bit. She believed other people were living in the flat, in the loft. She had lumps on her head and claimed she had been mugged in Bury.”
They made a trip to see Michael’s son and laid flowers at his grave in Whitefield. “The week I was over he was really good,” she added.
However, she noted that Stephen seemed uneasy as he didn’t have a home of his own and, with Susanne’s health declining, she suspected this created tension between them.
“The last I saw Stephen was when I was getting a taxi to the airport and it dropped him off in Bury outside Wilkos,” she recalled. “He was upset about me leaving, we were in contact every day.”
As the week progressed, he confessed to having given his mother a ‘slap’ following an argument. It was then on September 16 last year that he made a disturbing phone call to his grandma.
“He said she had broken the television and he was upset because I bought it,” Mary disclosed.
The witness recounted: “He called me and was saying: “I broke my mum’s wrist and I heard it snap’. I said ‘Has she been to hospital’ and he said ‘No she wants to go in the morning’.
“I said ‘check your mum and see how she is’ and said that she needed to get to hospital straight away. He shouted ‘mum’ a few times and there was no answer.”
“He said ‘She won’t talk to me, she won’t answer me’. I said ‘OK, is she breathing’. He said yeah and I could hear a weird noise in the background like heavy breathing, erratic breathing.”
“I said ‘You need to get her an ambulance right now and take her to hospital’. He said ‘if anything happens to my mum I will kill myself and I mean it’.”
She said that Stephen had claimed his mum had stolen his bank card whilst he was asleep and when he realised he ‘gave her a slap’. “I just don’t think he thought it was as serious as it was. Despite him saying he could hear her bone snap,” she told jurors.
She said she thought there was a ‘dawning realisation’ that something was wrong and that she wasn’t well. “I never got a phone call back to say how she was doing so I thought there was no update and I thought ‘Thank God maybe everything is ok’. Then the Garda knocked on my door.”
Michael Brady KC, representing Ball at his trial, asked: “You said to the police ‘This was an explosion waiting to happen’. What did you mean by that? ” The grandmother expressed her dismay, saying: “I don’t think he should have been released into his mother’s flat. It was only a one bed flat in her name.”
She detailed the difficulties faced due to her daughter’s deteriorating condition: “Her dementia and mental health was so bad and it was very hard to put up with it. She was just shouting and screaming all the time.”
The court heard that Susanne suffered extensive bruising, including marks on her face matching the sole of Ball’s ASICS trainers.
Amidst the chaos, Ball was heard yelling ‘thieving b****’ and ‘Mum, let me in’, prompting neighbours to alert the authorities. A post-mortem examination revealed that blunt force trauma to the head resulted in her death, with ‘patterned bruising’ noted on her face.
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Reflecting on her grandson’s situation, Mary lamented that he was ‘failed dreadfully’ by various services. She elaborated: “He has been failed by probation, prison and his mental health team. I don’t think he got the support he should have had.”
She also commented on the physical disparity between her daughter and grandson: “She was terribly frail, just skin and bone. Stephen was strong. They have been a major worry for years, especially since Michael passed away.”
Describing Susanne’s life, she said: “She had a chaotic and tragic life but for it to end the way it did is a nightmare.”
Following a week-long trial, Ball was convicted of the murder of Susanne and is set to be sentenced the following month.
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