A retired British factory worker who admitted to strangling his wife for just days in the first national detention of the coronavirus has been found not guilty of murder.
Anthony Williams, 70, told police in Wales that he was “literally choking the living daylight” from his 46-year-old wife, Ruth, at their home in Cwmbran on March 28, five days after the British lockdown that left him “depressed”. reported the Independent.
Williams told the detectives that he murdered his 67-year-old wife after “snapping” during an argument. He had retired as a factory worker 18 months earlier and was not doing well in the aftermath, according to the report.
“I’m sorry, I just cheated,” he told officers on the spot. “Sorry.”
Williams strangled his wife with a robe cord, according to the Sun, who also noted that the gruesome attack was the first reported lockdown murder. Prosecutors said he went to a neighbor’s house after the murder and confessed.
“She’s dead, I killed her – we had a fight and I strangled her,” Williams reportedly told an operator. “You have to come right away.”
The officers found Ruth Williams on the couple’s porch holding a set of keys. She was later pronounced dead in a hospital, where doctors found bleeding in her eyes, face and mouth, as well as five fractures on her neck, the sun reported.
During the trial, jurors overheard footage of Williams urging police that his wife’s death was “not murder,” claiming that he “had no intention” to kill her.
“I just turned around, it wasn’t me,” Williams told agents, according to the Sun. “I wouldn’t hurt a fly, it wasn’t me, I’m not like that and I don’t know what came over me.”
A jury from the Swansea court unanimously acquitted Williams of murder on Monday.
A psychologist testified that Williams’ anxiety and depression were “amplified” by the strict COVID-19 lockdown and affected his ability to control his actions, the Independent reported.
Williams’ former job had been “one of his main coping mechanisms” to his “neurotic predisposition,” psychologist Alison Witts reportedly told the court.
But a second psychologist told jurors that Williams had “no psychiatric” defense for the murder, saying he had no history of depression.
[Williams] knew what he was doing at the time, ”psychologist Damian Gamble told the court.
The couple’s daughter, meanwhile, said she feared her father was “ getting out of control ” months earlier, telling her he thought the couple would lose their home despite not having a mortgage and over $ 205,000 in savings, reported BBC.
The father, who had previously pleaded guilty to manslaughter for reduced responsibility, will reportedly be sentenced by a judge on Thursday on the lesser charge.