Woman jailed after drunken killing

A woman who fatally stabbed her partner in a drunken rage has been convicted of manslaughter.

Pauline Rutherford was jailed for three years at Belfast Crown Court on Tuesday.

The 34-year-old east Belfast mother of four stabbed her partner William Samuel McClure after he had punched and threw paint over.

Both she and her partner were aggressive and abusive to each other and she herself could manifest violence

Mr Justice Girvan

She was also ordered to serve 18 months probation on her release and undergo alcohol and anger management treatment.

The court heard Rutherford stabbed Mr McClure, 35, after being provoked during a drunken row in their Invernook Drive home on 1 July last year.

Mr Justice Girvan told Rutherford while she may not have intended to kill her partner, she was not "an entirely innocent wife who experienced mental and physical abuse" by him.

Kitchen knife

The judge said their relationship was "characterised by volatility, alcohol and drug misuse".

He said Rutherford also drank to excess with others who "reinforced her inappropriate behaviour".

"She and her partner both drank to excess. Both she and her partner were aggressive and abusive to each other and she herself could manifest violence," said the judge.

William threw paint all over me and punched me, so I stabbed him

Pauline Rutherford

The accused's teenage son raised the alarm after attempting to save Mr McClure whom he found bleeding from a wound to his side and his mother brandishing "a big kitchen knife".

He was rushed to hospital but died a short time after arrival. A 12cm stab wound had pierced his left ventricle.

Following her arrest, Rutherford said: "William threw paint all over me and punched me, so I stabbed him."

She said she could not remember what led to the drunken argument or how she came to have a knife.

Rutherford was originally accused of murdering Mr McClure but the charge was dropped when the prosecution accepted her guilty plea to manslaughter on the grounds of provocation.