London Bridge attack: Nurse stabbed in neck by 'evil' terrorist as she tried to help victim

  • Video report by ITV News Correspondent Juliet Bremner

A nurse was stabbed in the neck by an "evil" terrorist as she tried to help victims of the London Bridge attack, an inquest heard.

Waiter Alexandre Pigeard, 26, was grabbed by one of the attackers and repeatedly stabbed outside the Boro Bistro on June 3, 2017.

Nurse Helen Kennett saw his neck wound and offered to help, although Mr Pigeard shook his head and told her "no, just run".

Ms Kennett confronted his attacker, asking him "what's wrong with you?"

The knifeman replied: "No, what's wrong with you?", and plunged the 12 inch blade into her neck, The Old Bailey heard.

Alexandre Pigeard, 26, was grabbed by one of the attackers and repeatedly stabbed outside the Boro Bistro. Credit: PA

Ms Kennett was drinking prosecco at Boro Bistro with her mother and sister when the attackers crashed their van on London Bridge before attacking bystanders in Borough Market.

She told the Old Bailey she first believed there had been a car crash when she was Mr Pigeard had been injured.

She said: “Everybody was standing up and getting more and more shouting and upset. In any emergency situation I’m trained to be quite inward. I can be calm when I need to be.

“I glanced to my right, which was towards where the steps are coming down, and I saw a man who was very, very injured.

“There was just a lot of blood and then, as I got closer, I saw there was a cut right across the neck. It looked like there was multiple injuries on the body but my attention was the neck.

“I looked at him and thought, ‘That’s not a car accident that’s something more’. It happened so quickly and I thought, ‘He’s been attacked by a knife’, and then I saw the knife.”

She offered to help Mr Pigeard, but he urged her to run from the attacker.

The eight victims of the London Bridge terror attack. Credit: PA

As she looked up, she saw the terrorist who plunged the knife into the left side of her neck.

When asked to describe the attacker in court, Ms Kennett said all she could remember were his eyes.

She said: "They were soulless. Evil. They were just empty.

Describing her injuries, Ms Kennett went on: “The only way I can describe it was like somebody had thrown a bucket of warm water over me. I felt this rushing all down my body and I thought, ‘Oh no, I’ve been stabbed as well’.”

After suffering from her injuries, Ms Kennett said she tried to get back to her family as she did not want to die alone on the steps.

London Bridge attackers Khuram Butt, Rachid Redouane and Youssef Zaghba Credit: Metropolitan Police/PA

“Two guys had jumped over the bushes and they were attacking people. Everybody was shouting. Everybody was screaming. I thought at that point, ‘I cannot help anybody, I’m going to die’" she said.

Ms Kennett added: “I did not want to die there. I wanted to die around the corner with my family.”

The off-duty nurse managed to escape with her mother and sister into the Mudlark pub, where she was treated for her injuries.

“I did not want to die there. I wanted to die around the corner with my family.”

She added: "I remember falling to the floor because I was slipping in my own blood.”

She was given a T-shirt and tea towel to wrap around her wound as she waited for medical help.

Gareth Patterson QC, for the Pigeard family, said: “Thank you for your instincts in offering to help Alex, the waiter.”