Jury shown murder 'confession video'

A woman on trial for murdering her husband 17 years ago described to police the noises her husband made as he died after she fed him a meal full of sleeping pills.
Christine King, 51, of Te Aroha, Waikato, has denied murdering Wayne Roycroft in November 1988.

"I knew when I heard his breathing there was something wrong. I tried to fix him but couldn't undo his shirt or sit him up," King said on the police video, recorded in May last year.

Later, when dragging Mr Roycroft's body outside to bury him in the garden, King fell into the shallow grave she had dug and his body landed on top of her.

Watching the video statement in the High Court at Hamilton yesterday was too much for King, 51, who rushed from the courtroom fighting back tears.

In the video, she told Detective Peter Hikaka how she waited until half an hour after Mr Roycroft had stopped making noises before returning to the lounge where he was lying on the couch.

"I remember thinking 'Oh my God what am I going to do?' because he smelled," she said.

Mr Hikaka told King her former boyfriend Paul Baxendale had confessed to digging the body up and burning it on a bonfire.

"I knew one day it would come out," she said.

During her evidential video King also outlined some of the abuse she claimed to have suffered from her husband before she "snapped" that night.

Defence lawyer Judith Ablett-Kerr QC will open the defence case today.

- nzpa