Court hears UK primary school teacher Fiona Beal used Covid as cover after killing cheating boyfriend

A UK primary school teacher killed her boyfriend, stabbing him in the neck after luring him to the bedroom for sex, a court has heard.

Fiona Beal, 50, has admitted the manslaughter of boyfriend Nick Billingham but denies it was murder, saying she suffered a “loss of control” after a controlling and abusive relationship.

Billingham was tied to the couple’s bed when he died on November 1, 2021, suffering a fatal wound to the jugular.

The Old Bailey then heard how Beal claimed to have contracted Covid-19, necessitating a 10-day lockdown at home. Prosecutor Hugh Davies, KC, told the jury that the Covid was central to what he termed a “grand deception”, the Daily Mail reports.

“There is no evidence she ever did a PCR test. Her actions in the next 10 days are wholly inconsistent with having the exhausting effects of Covid which she was claiming to be experiencing,” Davies said, alleging that Beal purchased the knife before the killing and then immediately set about buying cleaning products, bin bags and new bedware after Billingham was killed.

Fiona Beal.

Billingham’s mummified body was found in the garden of their Northampton home four months later, after an extensive police probe that uncovered Beal’s journals planning and reflecting on the killing.

“This is considered, controlled, conduct that is on the one hand intrinsically practical, and on the other indulgent,” Davies said of Beal’s actions after Billingham’s death.

“It is the more so given she must literally have watched her partner bleed to death in front of her.”

Nick Billingham.

Beal later messaged friends and family about the Covid she claimed she and Billingham were suffering from, saying she was using bleach to stay on top of the virus in the home.

“This was the cover story, better described you may think as a grand deception,” Davies told jurors.

‘Coercive and controlling’

The court heard that Billingham had been unfaithful in the past but the couple had reconciled and he had moved back in.

Defence barrister Andrew Wheeler, KC, told the jury that his client was “quite literally broken” after a “coercive and controlling relationship”.

“This case is not as straightforward as the prosecution suggest,” Wheeler said.

“Fiona Beal is a lady of good character, a partner to Nick Billingham for 17 years, a hardworking and thoroughly liked schoolteacher.

“A lady about whom you will hear many good things said. So how does that person suddenly go on to kill?”

The trial continues.