A HARROGATE woman who stabbed her abusive husband in the chest with a kitchen knife during a drunken row at their home has been jailed for more than three years.
Kimberley Louise Flintoft, 32, stabbed Lee Flintoft, 39, in the kitchen of their house at Kirkham Road, Bilton, in the early hours of July 20 last year with the knife she was using to make a sandwich.
She pleaded guilty to manslaughter by way of p
rovocation after admitting she "lost both her temper and self-control" following a stormy 16-year relationship. At Leeds Crown Court, on Wednesday, she was sentenced to 40 months in jail. She was told she must serve at least half of that sentence before being eligible to be released on licence.
The court heard the couple would become aggressive after they had been drinking. During their relationship, Flintoft suffered violence and demands for sex from her husband and she admitted being “verbally nasty and aggressive” to him.
In an email between the couple read out in court – written when they temporarily split – she wrote: “I’m fed up with you telling me what I can and can’t do. I don’t care what you say for the past 14 years I have always done as you choose. I do love you Lee but I just can’t cope with living my life like that anymore.”
Prosecuting, Andrew Robertson QC said: “The general view of those that knew the couple was that they loved each other but that they fought frequently.”
The court heard how Flintoft had been at her brother’s flat showing holiday snaps, where she drank a bottle of wine and a glass of champagne.
Mr Flintoft, who had been out drinking at the Bilton Working Men’s Club, came to collect his wife and an “atmosphere developed”. Both were more than twice the legal drink-drive limit.
Mr Flintoft got into a taxi, where he shouted at his wife to “get a (expletive) move on” as he was hungry.
In a statement the driver said he noticed Mr Flintoft’s “attitude had changed” when his wife got in the car. Mr Flintoft said she was in a bad mood and it “looked like he wouldn’t be getting anything to eat”.
Defending, Andrew Campbell QC said: “Back at the house Mr Flintoft repeated he was hungry and demanded food.
