A UK pensioner accused of murdering his terminally ill wife has told the court she “was crying and begging” him to end her life.
David Hunter, 76, wept as he recalled moments before his cancer wife Janice died in his arms as he gave testimony in Cyprus.
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Hunter, from Northumberlandwas locked in Nicosia Central prison for more than a year after admitting to strangling his 56-year-old wife Janice with his bare hands in December 2021.
But grandpa insisted in court on Monday, Janice, 74, begged him to take her life because of the excruciating pain she was enduring.
Retired miner Hunter said: “For six weeks she begged me to help her end her life. I didn’t want to.
“I’ve lived with her for 57 years. Our relationship is perfect. I love her.”
Wearing a dark shirt, sneakers and black jeans, Hunter told the three-member court that his wife had been locked in their rented house in a village above Paphos for three years.
Janice was forced to wear diapers because of the side effects of her medication and lost all interest in life.
Hunter added: “She was in a lot of pain. She had a lot of other surgeries on her face (for skin cancer) and her hands, knees and feet.
“I felt so helpless and hopeless that I couldn’t do anything for her.
“For the past week, she has been crying and begging me, every day she wants to be a little stronger to do it.
“Last week, she started crying. She started crying and begging me.
“She said, ‘I can’t go on. This life is not for me. We just go to the hospital and stay at home. I don’t have any quality of life and I’m completely fed up with this. I can’t continue’.
“She started going hysterical so I said, ‘Yes, I’ll help you’.”
The Briton has occasionally sobbed as he recounts the traumatic final days of his wife’s life – but as he spoke, judge Michalis Droussiotis nodded, shocking a courtroom packed with reporters.
Michal Polak, the barrister who heads Justice Abroad, the legal aid group that helps Britons abroad and flew to the trial, said David had waited “a long time to hear about his events.” “.
He added: “Only he was there. Only he knows what really happened.
“This is a very sad, very tragic case. David and Janice had a long loving marriage.”
Hunter confessed to blocking Janice’s airway – but insisted he only did so after giving in to her pleas for relief from the pain she was suffering from her worsening leukemia .
The couple, originally from Ashington, were teenage lovers and had been together for more than 50 years when they retired to Tremithusa, a popular village outside Paphos.
Hunter, who was faced with the prospect of spending the rest of his life behind bars, tried to commit suicide by overdose took the prescription as soon as he informed his brother, back home, of what had happened.
When police arrived at the mansion, he was sitting in a white leather chair next to the woman he called “the love of my life”.
Hunter also told the court that his wife’s sister Kathryn had died 30 years ago of the same illness and that Janice, who had cared for her in the hospital, said: “If I had this disease, I wouldn’t have had it. want to live.”
When cross-examined by the state prosecutor handling the case, Hunter broke down with emotion when he was shown pictures of the crime scene.
He said: “I can’t remember anything about what I said to anyone who came that night.”
Showing the packs of pills he took to take his own life, he said, “After what happened, I don’t want to live anymore.”
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