A man wept as he stabbed his wife because he couldn't stand seeing her suffer anymore from Alzheimer's disease, a Belfast court heard yesterday. The Crown Court also heard that pensioner Desmond Douglas was at the end of his tether and after stabbing his 7O-year-old wife Pat through the heart tried to kill himself.
Lord Justice MacDermott said it was an "extremely tragic case", adding later, "anyone looking at this case would have to ask why, after years of devoted care this frightful event occurred?"
But Lord Justice MacDermott said while Douglas's remorse for the wife he now misses was genuine, mercy killing was unacceptable. He said normally such cases demanded an immediate jail term, but "the opinion of the experts" was Douglas be placed on probation for three years. Defence QC Mr Eugene Grant said Douglas (67) had "lost complete control" when he carried out "what in a sense was a mercy killing". For six years Douglas single-handedly looked after his wife, keeping secret her gradual and severe deterioration from Alzheimer's fearing the authorities would put her in residential care.
They'd met in Torquay 4O years earlier when Douglas was in the Royal Navy and on his discharge in 1962 the couple set up home in east Belfast. Prosecuting QC Mr John Creaney said when his wife became sick in 1991, Douglas "devoted himself" to look after her, later taking early retirement from the post office to do so.
"He seemed on the face of it to have managed reasonably well," he added, but inside Douglas was finding life hard caring for his wife who by that stage was also blind."
At about 6 a.m. on January 16th last year ambulance men called by Douglas found him sitting on a chair with stab wounds to his stomach - and his wife dead in bed from three stab wounds to the chest. "She was at me all night and I lost my head - I just had enough," Mr Douglas told police. He later added that after stabbing his wife, "she was screaming and she said she wanted to die, and I said I would help her".
Mr Douglas was accused of murdering his wife in their Cuba Walk home in east Belfast, but the charge was dropped when he pleaded guilty to manslaughter due to diminished responsibility.