He ‘tried to kill his blind wife because he could not cope with caring for her’

A 90-year-old man tried to stab his blind wife to death as she slept because he could not cope with caring for her, a court heard.

Edward Turpin tried to murder frail Joan Turpin, also 90, at their home in Ringshall Road, Orpington, Kent, last 22 September after decades of ‘happy marriage.’

Ms Turpin said in a video recorded while she was in hospital: ‘He woke me up with the knife in my chest, telling me he couldn’t take any more.

‘It made him ill and then the knife went in. I was screaming for help.’

Prosecutor Alistair Richardson warned jurors that the case they were about to try was a ‘sad one’ and it concerned ‘a happy marriage that has become mired by poor health, and with the defendant no longer able to cope with caring for his wife’.

‘But what neither society, nor the law, permit, even in the heat of the moment, is for us to take matters into our own hands, and seek to end someone else’s life,’ the prosecutor said.

‘The answer to finding caring for our partner too much can never be to try to take their life.’

Jurors heard that as Mrs Turpin’s health declined, she lost her sight and she needed a catheter.

Her husband was her main carer and she was totally dependent on him.

‘At about 1:30 in the morning, on 22 September 2021, the defendant ran out of patience with his wife’s ill health, and his caring responsibilities, and he attacked her in her bed attempting to kill her,’ Mr Richardson said.

The Old Bailey heard that she suffered two stab wounds to the chest and two to her upper abdomen.

The injuries to her chest caused her right lung to collapse.

After the attack, Turpin called the emergency services and said: ‘I can’t take any more of it…she’s been ill and it’s got right on top of me.’

He said: ‘I tried to stab her and I’ve stabbed myself.’

Turpin said he had stabbed his wife ‘by her heart’.

‘You will of course appreciate the significance of the defendant telling the operator that he had stabbed his wife in the area of her heart,’ the prosecutor said.

‘What is the purpose of targeting the heart with a knife? Plainly, it’s to kill.

‘The operator went on to say he would tell the defendant how to stop the bleeding.

‘And the defendant replied: “No, I don’t want to stop the bleeding. We want to die.”’

But the wife ‘robustly rejects’ the suggestion that the two were participating in a ‘suicide pact’, the court heard.

The alleged stabber hung up only for the operator to call again. This happened twice.

Jurors listened to the chilling recordings of the three 999 calls.

During the third call, Turpin told the operator: ‘I don’t want nothing done now. I want to die. She wants to die.’

She can be heard in the background crying out for help. Turpin is recorded shouting: ‘Joan, stop it,’ in response to her cries.

Following the calls, police officers and the London Ambulance Service attended the couple’s home.

Ms Turpin told officers that her husband had stabbed her, the prosecutor said.

Jurors heard her husband was downstairs and speaking to other officers at the same time, explaining: ‘I’ve had enough. I just can’t stand no more.’

Turpin, of Ringshall Road, Orpington, denies attempted murder and wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

When she was interviewed by police on 3 November 2021, Mrs Turpin insisted to police officers that her husband was a ‘lovely man’.

In the video interview played to the court she said: ‘Adore him. And he adores me.

‘Absolutely wonderful. Never ever did he put one finger on me.

‘I think he was a wonderful man. No one has anything bad to say about that man.’

In another account, she said that he was normally a ‘very very kind person’ and that everyone called him ‘an angel’.

The couple were married for over 60 years, the court heard.

Asked by officers why she thought he would attack her, she said it was because he was stressed. She thought he might have been stressed about her blindness.

‘You only do something like that when you don’t know what you are doing.

‘You’re asking me silly questions if you don’t mind me saying.’

Her husband had never had any mental health problems, the court heard.

Mrs Turpin said she did not remember much of the incident.

‘We went up to bed and I don’t remember anymore.

‘And then I was screaming. Because I was frightened.

‘When you’re blind. You can’t see anything. You don’t know what’s going on do you?

‘I just felt his hand on my chest. Not hurting me just resting there.

‘He was screaming to the police. To come here, that’s all. That’s all I remember.’

Mrs Turpin added that she had not been in any pain.

Furthermore, she denied ever talking with her husband abut a ‘suicide pact’.

Her cross-examination was also recorded and played in court. In the video, Mrs Turpin was wearing a black poncho with a leopard print collar and red trousers.

She insisted to her husband’s defence barrister, Simon Gledhill, that the care he provided her had been ‘absolutely perfect’.

Jurors heard that Turpin would help his wife move around after she lost her sight and that he took on responsibility for cooking.

Asked if she used to ‘shout and scream’ at him, Mrs Turpin said: ‘All I said to him was try and get some more help with me. Helping, with general stuff.

‘I asked him to get more help because I knew it might get him down. He had the money, it wasn’t the money issue.’

Turpin had allegedly told his niece that he could not look after his wife, that he could not be a full time helper.

Body-worn video from police officers who attended the scene the night of the attack was also played in court.

Turpin had his face in his hands as jurors watched the footage.

His injured wife could be seen sitting on the blood-stained bed wearing a yellow cardigan and plaid pyjama bottoms.

‘He stabbed me,’ she told officers.

‘Where is he?

‘I’m blind.

‘Will you help me?

‘I can’t breathe.

‘He said he has had enough.’

Ms Turpin was taken to King’s College Hospital with ‘life-threatening’ injuries.

She is now recovered and living in a care home.

The trial continues tomorrow (thurs).
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