Teresa Hanson: Wife 'killed husband after row over tea' – court

A woman fatally stabbed her husband with a kitchen knife following a row over having tea, a jury has heard.

Teresa Hanson, 54, stabbed Paul Hanson once in the chest as she was chopping onions at their East Yorkshire home last Christmas, Hull Crown Court was told.

Mr Hanson, 54, died at the house in Little London Lane, in West Cowick, near Snaith.

Mrs Hanson denies murdering her husband on 28 December 2022.

Prosecutors said the couple had “a long-standing and substantially happy marriage” but on the night of his death Mrs Hanson had “lost her temper” after her husband said he did not want tea and told her to put it in the bin.

The jury of seven men and five women was told Mrs Hanson said she only realised he was injured when she heard the dog barking and then saw his blood on the floor.

Alistair MacDonald KC, prosecuting, said she had then called 999 saying she had unintentionally stabbed her husband “out of anger” before calling back to say: “We had an argument and… I don’t know what I did. But please come now.”

When two paramedics arrived at the scene, she offered to give each £1,000 to save her husband, the court was told.

After Mrs Hanson was arrested she told police: “I didn’t mean to do it, it was just an argument.”

She later claimed her husband had “walked into a blade that she was holding” while she was preparing food.

Mr MacDonald read out a transcript of her interview, in which she said: “I turned towards him with the knife still in my hand, but not in a threatening way. As I turned with the knife in my hand, he walked towards me, and then I turned around.

“I had no idea that when he walked towards me, that he came straight at me, and the knife went into him.”

She went on to tell officers her husband had been “quite a big drinker” throughout their marriage and he had mentally and verbally abused her.

However, Mr MacDonald said “she was quite clear that she did not stab her husband because he had been abusive”.

Opening the case against Mrs Hanson the barrister said it was “nothing short of absurd” she “did not notice the drops of blood” and only realised she had stabbed her husband when she “went back to slicing onions and continued to prepare the evening meal”.

Dr Michael Parsons, a Home Office pathologist, told the court: “In my opinion, it’s highly unlikely that Mr Hanson walked on to a weakly grasped knife.”

Jurors also heard statements from the couple’s neighbour and Mrs Hanson’s sister-in-law detailing how they had never had serious concerns about the couple’s relationship.

Neighbours Sean and Rachel Trafford did, however, describe hearing doors banging minutes before Mr Hanson’s death and instances of the couple shouting at each other in the past.

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