A jury has cleared a woman of murdering her partner in her former Dundee home.
Kerri Hutcheson, 34, stood trial accused of killing 33-year-old Graeme Hutcheson by stabbing him through the heart with a knife at an address on Whitfield Avenue on March 7 2022.
Mr Hutcheson, originally of the Glasgow area, was pronounced dead at 11.35pm after paramedics could find no vital signs of life.
He was discovered by a police officer lying topless on his back having suffered a single stab wound to the chest.
Hutcheson denied murdering her partner of four months and lawyers claimed she acted in self-defence.
By majority, the jury at the High Court in Dundee returned a not proven verdict on Wednesday morning.
‘Told you’
Judge Lady Drummond told Hutcheson, who appeared in the dock clutching a blue holdall: “Kerri Hutcheson you have been acquitted by this jury. You are free to go.”
A person could be heard saying “told you” while Hutcheson’s emotional friends and family embraced her as she left the packed court room.
Prior to the verdict being delivered, Lady Drummond warned those in the public gallery to respect the court and to be quiet.
During the trial, Hutcheson, a former carer, claimed Mr Hutcheson picked up the eight-inch blade from a dish rack after she told him the relationship was over.
Jurors were told how Hutcheson swiped the knife away which then pierced through Mr Hutcheson’s chest, past his rib cage and into his heart.
Hutcheson was found with a minor cut on the back of her hand which she claimed was caused while defending herself from being attacked.
She told the court that she accepted responsibility for Mr Hutcheson’s death but denied her actions were murderous.
Argument over bingo night
The couple – who shared a surname by coincidence and were not married – had been embroiled in a row from the previous Friday night with Mr Hutcheson said to be unhappy about his partner going on a night out to the bingo.
The argument would fester until the Monday with neighbours hearing shouting and swearing coming from the property later that night.
Hutcheson said in her evidence: “He came at me with a knife from the dish rack. He was close to me.
“The knife was coming towards my face. I thought he was going to kill us. I put my hands up over my face.
“I used my hand to put it over his hand so he couldn’t strike me again. The knife went into Graeme.”
‘It was a silly f***ing argument’
Hutcheson described herself as “raging” and “ready to blow” in WhatsApp messages with a friend hours before Mr Hutcheson’s death.
Jurors heard the harrowing 999 call Hutcheson made to emergency services. Mr Hutcheson could be heard groaning in the frantic call, which lasted 23 minutes.
Hutcheson, now of Harcourt Street, repeatedly pleaded for help to be sent and said the lack of information she provided to the call handler was due to shock.
Police officers believed Hutcheson was visibly under the influence of alcohol and cautioned her after making a string of remarks from when they first encountered her in the house until placing her in a cell at the West Bell Street headquarters.
The remarks included: “Am I going to get 40 years for this? Am I gonna end up with years in the jail for this? F****** great going to get years in the jail.
“Am I a murderer? I could jump up and murder you with the way I was earlier on.
“He cut me, I have cut him. It was a silly f****** argument.”
In the course of evidence, jurors heard of Mr Hutcheson’s previous convictions for domestic offending and threatening or abusive behaviour.
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