Jewish woman accused of murdering husband of 27 years with lunch knife

Michael Brady KC, prosecuting, told the jury that there were only three possible explanations for the stab wound to Mr Berman’s chest: that it was an accident, a suicide or a homicide.

“For reasons we say will become clear, accident and suicide can be ruled out, so that, as unpalatable as it may seem, and given the presence of pathological features of homicide, we say the only explanation for Mr Berman’s death is that the defendant killed him, and we say that in stabbing Mr Berman to the chest she intended to cause him at least really serious harm,” he said.

The jury heard how paramedics were called to the couple’s address at around 2pm. When asked by a 999 call handler what happened, Berman said her husband was carrying a knife on a tray when he “slipped” and it stabbed him.

A recording of the call was played to the court in which Berman repeatedly screams her husband’s name and says: “Blood is coming from his mouth”.

The call handler tells her to put her husband on his back so she can start chest compressions.

Paramedics found David, who had recently been diagnosed with dementia, on the kitchen floor, with the tray, a 12cm long knife and a broken plate next to him, the jury heard.

Berman also told them her husband had fallen over while carrying the tray and “landed on the knife”.

Attempts were made to resuscitate David, who had gone into cardiac arrest, but he was pronounced dead around 40 minutes later.

When police were called to the scene Berman told one officer: “You don’t think I’ve murdered him do you?”

She told them she’d heard two loud thuds from the kitchen and gone “tearing in”, the jury heard.

Seeing her stricken husband had felt like “an out of body experience”, she said.

On hearing detectives were on their way, she told officers: “I didn’t do anything” and “Do you really think I’ve done it?”

Following David’s death, his family members noticed how “matter of fact” and “emotionless” the defendant appeared, Brady told the court.

Berman was not arrested at the time and the case was referred to the coroner.

When two pathologists later conducted separate post-mortems, one found that although it was not impossible, an accidental fall was “very unlikely” to have caused the fatal chest wound given its location close to the right armpit, and the direction and shape of the wound, the jury heard.

The second “dismissed” the possibility that the injury was caused by accident and found it was “entirely” typical of a homicidal stab wound.

David was also deemed to have suffered a “defensive” wound to his middle finger.

Berman was eventually arrested but maintained her husband’s death was tragic accident.

In one interview, she told detectives she had “screamed” after finding her husband and had experienced the “shock of her life” upon seeing so much blood.

She also suggested her husband’s chest wound may have been caused by him falling onto the knife as he held it, but in a later interview answered “no comment” to questions.

The jury had heard earlier how the great-grandfather had been in “declining health”. As well as living with dementia, he had suffered a pneumothorax, calcification in the upper chambers of the heart, undergone a hip replacement and needed a walking stick.

Berman told police her husband was prone to falls and when speaking to a neighbour about the dementia, she told him: “This my life now”.

But despite a shortness of breath, his family believed he was in the “best health” he had been in for some time and was becoming “more independent”. On the morning of his death he had visited a soft play centre with his daughter and great-granddaughter, the court heard.

The couple’s 27-year marriage was described to jurors as “loving and mutually supportive” and they were also told there was no domestic violence or other history on police systems.

Berman was said to be “very supporting and loving” and there were no concerns about her behaviour toward her husband.

The trial continues.