A 54-year-old woman from Whitechapel in East London repeatedly stabbed her husband with a kitchen knife after a holiday, dolphin-spotting boat trip ended in failure an Old Bailey court heard yesterday.
Tracy Dell, a haidresser from Berner Street, plunged the nine-inch blade into the chest and abdomen of her husband, Toby, after the boat trip's search for dolphins off the coast of The Alrgave in Portugal proved fruitless.
Under cross-examination from prosecuting counsel, Carter Shay, Mrs Dell admitted to causing grievous bodily harm but claimed mitigating circumstances.
'When he booked that boat trip he told me that we'd definitely see dolphins, she told the court.
'I was really looking forward to seeing them in the wild and not on telly, so when we didn't see any I was gutted and went for him with the knife when we got back to our apartment.
'Anyone would have done the same in my shoes' she concluded before leaving the witness box.
'Giving Mrs Dell a six-month suspended sentence, Judge Helen Galsworthy, told Mrs Dell: 'While I recognise that you were sorely provoked and that your husband failed you in every way imaginable, I cannot condone your actions in this instance.
'A good beating with a frying pan, combined with the complete withdrawal of conjugal favours for life would have been more than adequate given the severity of this man's utter failure to deliver on a concrete assurance'
In 2010, Judge Shay came in for criticism after awarding a woman from Cripplegate in East London, five hundred pounds from the public purse after she killed and subsequently dismembered the corpse of her husband who took her on a holiday jeep safari in Nairobi that failed to come across any giraffes.
