Katie like many other young people in today’s society, enjoyed socialising on the social network Facebook, she received many emails every day from admirers. One of her admirers in particular, caught her attention, Daniel Lynch. Lynch was a Martial Arts enthusiast, aged 33, he emailed Katie regularly and Katie felt they had a lot in common; she too had been involved with some promotional work in martial arts. Lynch followed Katie’s career and decided to meet her at one of her promotional events in Reading.
Katie thought that Lynch seemed quite shy and nervous at first but sadly this all changed very quickly. At first Katie was flattered by how often Lynch contacted her, he emailed and called her all the time but soon it became quite obsessive, Katie began to feel quite stifled by all the contact and planned to end the relationship but didn’t say anything to Lynch.
If Katie was aware of Lynch’s background she never would have agreed to date him. Lynch had convictions of violence and had served a jail sentence for throwing boiling water into the face of another man.
Katie first witnessed Lynch’s violence when he had an outburst of anger at a shop assistant. Lynch seemed to calm down and return to normal after a while, he suggested to Katie that they hire a hotel room for the night, Katie agreed. Unfortunately it was that night that the terrible abuse started. Katie has an appointment the next morning, so she couldn’t stay with Lynch for all that long. They pair went for a meal and enjoyed a bottle of wine together; they both seemed to be having a very enjoyable evening, however, when they returned to the hotel room, Lynch raped Katie and held her hostage for eight long hours. He smashed her head open, beat her up and also threatened to cut her face open with a razor. He said he was going to hang her in the room with a belt, he later claimed that he was high on steroids.
Katie felt she had to clear the hotel room up in fear of Lynch’s behaviour if the hotel staff found out. There was blood everywhere from the severe head injury Katie had sustained. Lynch later drove Katie home to her flat where surprisingly, he agreed to let Katie go, this was at 5pm the following day.
Katie was in fear of reporting the matter to the Police or to the doctors at the hospital where she had to have her head glued as she thought Lynch would come after her if she put a foot out of place. The phone calls continued and Lynch was full of apology. Lynch begged Katie to read one of his emails. With Katie’s internet being down, she agreed to read the email and decided to head to one of the nearby Internet Cafe’s. Lynch was on the phone to Katie as she made her way to the Cafe, he was asking her questions such as what was she wearing.
On the way to the Cafe, Katie spotted what looked to be a homeless person walking towards her with a cup; she reached into her bag for some change. As the man approached her he threw the contents of the cup all over Katie’s face. To start with Katie thought he had thrown coffee into her face, she could feel the burning immediately and remembered thinking “How rude to throw coffee when I was trying to help him”. Suddenly she saw her clothes evaporating and says the pain was “indescribable”. Katie lost her vision and was much disorientated, she wondered across the street to get help; she could have been run over as the road was very busy.
When Katie did find help she had to wait over an hour to be treated as the medical staff were unsure of what the substance was. Katie’s face has been destroyed and her skin had been burnt away right down to the layer of fat with nothing underneath except bone, the liquid that had been thrown over Katie was industrial strength Sulfuric acid.
Katie has now undergone more than 30 operations but her face will never go back to how it was. She has decided to speak publicly about the attack in hopes that her bravery will regain some of her confidence.
Katie finds eating an enormous struggle as the Sulfuric acid went down her throat, causing scar tissue in her oesophagus leaving it centimetres wide. The physiological damage has been enormous, for eighteen months Katie didn’t even dear to leave the house in fear of strangers.
This is an awful story that should never have happened to such a lovely, innocent girl. Lynch has now been jailed for life along with Stefan Sylvester; Lynch will serve a minimum of 16 years. The effects of this attack are unimaginable and Katie just proves the beauty is much more than skin deep.