Cyprus court: Briton freely confessed to wife's killing
PAPHOS, Cyprus (AP) — A Cyprus court on Tuesday rejected a defense argument that a British man’s confession to killing his ailing wife was unlawfully obtained, because he was in no frame of mind at the time to speak to police without a lawyer present.
David Hunter, 75, made the statements to law enforcement officials and medical staff on five separate occasions following his arrest “undoubtedly of his own free will" without pressure or coercion, the three-judge panel said in a unanimous ruling.
The court said it couldn't accept testimony from a defense expert that Hunter suffered from “disassociation” following his wife Janice’s December 2021 killing at the couple’s retirement home in the coastal resort town of Paphos and wasn’t fully cognizant of what he was saying.
The court said that Hunter couldn't have suffered from disassociation. At the time of his arrest, he recalled to law enforcement officials and to his brother back in the U.K. in detail how he strangled his wife, because he wanted to end her suffering and how he had subsequently consumed a mixture of pills to end his own life.
Those pills included medication for his 74-year-old wife who suffered from myelodysplastic syndrome, a type of blood cancer.
The judges said they had “no doublt” that Hunter understood and was aware of what he told law enforcement officials who informed him of his rights.
The ruling means Hunter remains on trial for premeditated murder after a plea deal on a lesser charge of manslaughter collapsed in December last year.
Defense lawyers have called Janice Hunter’s death a matter of euthanasia or assisted suicide, and argued for a sentence that doesn't include prison time. They said Cyprus’ attorney general rebuffed what had been agreed were the facts of the case that would’ve sealed the plea agreement.
Michael Polak, a spokesperson for Justice Abroad, a group that defends Britons facing legal troubles in foreign countries, has accused the prosecution of “attempting to ensure that Mr. Hunter receives the highest possible sentence.”
But state prosecutor Andreas Hadjikyrou had argued it was the defense that introduced wording on which there was no agreement. He said defense lawyers told the court that Hunter admitted to killing his wife after she had asked him to do it.
Hadjikyrou said the prosecution wouldn't accept Hunter’s claim that his wife asked him to end her life unless he provided proof, either a written note or explicitly having communicated her wishes to the couple’s daughter.
The state prosecutor said that Cypriot authorities don’t want to set a precedent for any husband to kill his wife and claim after the fact that the killing was done with the wife’s consent.
The couple’s daughter, Lesley Cawthorne, was quoted in British media as saying that her mother had clearly conveyed her wish to die to Hunter.
Hadjikyrou had said defense attorneys turned down an earlier deal for Hunter to plead guilty to manslaughter.
