Katherine Knight
Encyclopedia
Katherine Mary Knight (born 24 October 1955) was the first Australia
n woman to be sentenced to life imprisonment
without parole. She was convicted of the murder
of her partner, John Charles Thomas Price (born 6 January 1955) in October 2001, and is currently detained in Mulawa Correctional Centre
now known as Silverwater women's prison.
in New South Wales
' Hunter Valley
, Barbara Roughan (Née
Thorley) was forced to move to Moree
after beginning a relationship with Ken Knight, a co-worker of her husband Jack Roughan. The Roughan and Knight families were both well known in the conservative rural town and the affair was a major scandal. Two of Roughan’s four children remained with their father while the two youngest were sent to live with an aunt in Sydney
.
Katherine Knight was the younger of twins born to Barbara and her de facto
partner Ken on 24 October 1955 in Tenterfield, New South Wales
. Jack Roughan died in 1959 and the two children who had lived with him moved in with the Knight family. Barbara’s grandmother was apparently an Indigenous Australian from the Moree area who had married an Irishman. She was proud of this fact and liked to think of her own family as Aboriginal. This was kept a family secret, as there was considerable racism
in the area at the time and this was a source of tension for the children. Apart from her twin, the only person Knight was close to was her uncle Oscar Knight who was a champion horseman
. She was devastated when he committed suicide
in 1969 and continues to maintain that his ghost visits her. The family moved back to Aberdeen the same year.
Katherine was by all accounts a pleasant girl who experienced uncontrollably murderous rages in response to minor upsets. When she attended Muswellbrook
high school, she became a loner and is remembered by classmates as a bully who stood over smaller children. She assaulted at least one boy at school with a weapon and was once injured by a teacher who was found to have acted in self-defense. By contrast, when not in a rage Knight was a model student and often earned awards for her good behavior. On leaving school at 15, without having learned to read or write, she gained employment as a cutter in a clothing factory. Twelve months later she left to start what she referred to as her "dream job", cutting up offal
at the local abattoir from where she was quickly promoted to boning and given her own set of butcher knives
. At home she hung the knives over her bed so that they "would always be handy if I needed them", a habit she continued - until her incarceration - everywhere she lived.
Knight married Kellett in 1974, at her request, with the couple arriving at the service on her motorcycle with a very intoxicated Kellett on the pillion
. As soon as they arrived Knight’s mother Barbara gave Kellett some advice:
The marriage was particularly violent and on one occasion a heavily pregnant Knight burned all Kellet's clothing and shoes before hitting him across the back of the head with a frying pan
, simply because he had arrived home late from a darts
competition after making the finals. In fear for his life, Kellet fled before collapsing in a neighbors house and he was later treated for a badly fractured skull. Police wanted to charge her but Knight was now on her best behaviour and talked Kellet into dropping the charges. In May 1976, shortly after the birth of their first child, Melissa Ann, Kellett left her for another woman and moved to Queensland
. The next day Knight was seen pushing her new baby in a pram
down the main street, violently throwing the pram from side to side. Knight was admitted to St Elmo's Hospital in Tamworth
where she was diagnosed with postnatal depression and spent several weeks recovering. After being released, Knight placed two month old Melissa on a railway line shortly before the train was due, then stole an axe, went into town and threatened to kill several people. A man known in the district as "Old Ted", who was foraging near the railway line, found and rescued Melissa, by all accounts only minutes before the train passed. Knight was arrested and again taken to St Elmo's Hospital but, apparently recovered, signed herself out the following day.
A few days later Knight slashed the face of a woman with one of her knives and demanded she drive her to Queensland to find Kellett. The woman escaped after they stopped at a service station
but by the time police arrived Knight had taken a little boy hostage and was threatening him with the knife. She was disarmed when police attacked her with brooms and she was admitted to the Morisset
Psychiatric Hospital. Knight told the nurses she had intended to kill the mechanic at the service station because he had repaired Kellett’s car, which had allowed him to leave, and then kill both her husband and his mother when she arrived in Queensland. When police informed Kellett of the incident he left his girlfriend and along with his mother, they both moved to Aberdeen to support her.
Knight was released on 9 August 1976 into the care of her mother-in-law and along with Kellett, they now moved to Woodridge
, a suburb of Brisbane
, where she obtained a job at the Dinmore meatworks in nearby Ipswich
. On 6 March 1980, they had another daughter, Natasha Maree. In 1984 Knight left Kellett and moved in, first with her parents in Aberdeen, then to a rented house in nearby Muswellbrook. Although she returned to work at the abattoir, she injured her back the following year and went on a disability pension. No longer needing to rent accommodation close to her work the government gave her a Housing Commission house in Aberdeen.
. Knight soon became jealous regarding what he did when she was not around and would often throw him out. He would move back to his apartment in Scone and then she would invariably follow and beg him to return. In May 1987 she cut the throat of his two-month-old dingo
pup in front of him for no more reason than as an example of what would happen if he ever had an affair before going on to knock him unconscious with a frying pan. In June 1988 she gave birth to her third daughter Sarah, which prompted Saunders to put a deposit on a house, which Knight paid off when her workers' compensation
came through in 1989. Knight decorated the house throughout with animal skins, skulls, rusty animal traps, leather jackets, old boots, rakes and pitchforks. No space, including the ceilings, was left uncovered. After an argument where she hit Saunders in the face with an iron
before stabbing him in the stomach with a pair of scissors, he moved back to Scone, but when he later returned home found she had cut up all his clothes. Saunders took long service leave
and went into hiding. Knight tried to find him but no one admitted to knowing where he was. Several months later he returned to see his daughter and found that Knight had gone to the police and told them she was afraid of him. They issued her with an Apprehended Violence Order (AVO) against him.
In 1998 they had a fight over Price’s refusal to marry her and in retaliation Knight videotaped items he had stolen from work and sent the tape to his boss. Although the items were out of date
medical kits that he had scavenged from the company rubbish tip
, Price was fired from the job he had held for 17 years. That same day he kicked her out and she returned to her own home while news of what she had done spread through the town.
A few months later Price restarted the relationship although he now refused to allow her to move in with him. The fighting became even more frequent and most of his friends would no longer have anything to do with him while they remained together.
Price in the chest. Finally fed up, he kicked her out of his house. On 29 February he stopped at the Scone Magistrate's Court on his way to work and took out an AVO
to keep her away from both himself and his children. That afternoon Price told his co-workers that if he did not come to work the next day, it would be because Knight had killed him. They pleaded with him not to go home but he told them that he believed she would kill his children if he did not. Price arrived home to find that Knight, although not there herself, had sent the children away for a sleep-over at a friend's house. He then spent the evening with his neighbors before going to bed at 11pm. Earlier that day, Knight had bought new black lingerie
and had videotaped all her children while making comments which have since been interpreted as a crude will
. Knight later arrived at Price's house while he was sleeping and sat watching TV for a few minutes before having a shower. She then woke Price and they had sex after which he fell asleep.
At 6am the next morning the neighbor became concerned that Price's car was still in the driveway and when Price did not arrive at work, his employer sent a worker to see what was wrong. Both the neighbor and worker tried knocking on Price's bedroom window to wake him but after noticing blood on the front door alerted the police who arrived at 8am. Breaking down the back door police found his body with Knight comatose from taking a large number of pills. She had stabbed Price with a butcher's knife while he was sleeping. According to the blood evidence, he awoke and tried to turn the light on before attempting to escape while Knight chased him through the house, he managed to open the front door and get outside but either stumbled back inside or was dragged back into the hallway where he finally died after bleeding out. Later, Knight went into Aberdeen and withdrew $1,000 from Price's ATM
account. Price's autopsy
revealed that he had been stabbed at least 37 times, in both the front and back of his body with many of the wounds extending into vital organs
. Several hours after Price had died, Knight skinned him and hung the skin from a meat hook on the architrave
of a door to the lounge room. She then decapitated
him and cooked parts of his body, serving up the meat with baked potato, pumpkin, zucchini, cabbage, yellow squash and gravy in two settings at the dinner table, along with notes beside each plate, each having the name of one of Price's children on it; she was preparing to serve his body parts to his children.
A third meal was thrown on the back lawn for unknown reasons and it is speculated Knight had attempted to eat it but could not and this has been put forward in support of her claim that she has no memory of the crime. Price's head was found in a pot with vegetables. The pot was still warm, estimated to be at between 40 and 50 degrees Celsius, indicating that the cooking had taken place in the early morning. Sometime later Knight arranged the body with the left arm draped over an empty 1.25 litre soft drink bottle with the legs crossed. This was claimed in court to be an act of defilement demonstrating Knight’s contempt for Price. Knight had left a hand written note on top of a photograph of Price. Blood stained and covered with small pieces of flesh the note read:
was rejected and she was arraigned
on 2 February 2001 on the charge of murdering Price, to which she entered a plea
of not guilty. Her trial was initially fixed for 23 July 2001 but was adjourned due to her counsel's illness and it was re-fixed for 15 October 2001.
When the trial commenced, Justice Barry O'Keefe offered the 60 jury prospects the option of being excused due to the nature of the photographic evidence which five accepted. When the witness list was read out to the prospects several more also dropped out after which the jury was empanelled. Knight's attorneys then spoke to the judge who adjourned to the following day; the next morning, Knight changed her plea to guilty, and the jury was dismissed. It was now made public that Justice O'Keefe had been advised of the plea change the day before. He had adjourned the trial and then ordered a psychiatric assessment overnight to determine if Knight understood the consequences of a guilty plea and was fit to make such a plea. Knight's legal team had planned to defend Knight by claiming amnesia
and dissociation
, a claim supported by most psychiatrists although they did consider her sane.
No reason has ever been given for the guilty plea, and despite giving it, Knight still refused to accept responsibility for her actions. At the sentencing hearing, Knight's lawyers requested that Knight be excused to avoid hearing some of the facts, but the application was refused. When Dr. Timothy Lyons took the stand and described the skinning and decapitation, Knight became hysterical and had to be sedated.
On 8 November, Justice O'Keefe pointed out that the nature of the crime and Knight's lack of remorse required a severe penalty; he sentenced her to life imprisonment, refused to fix a non-parole period and ordered that her papers be marked "never to be released", the first time that this had been imposed on a woman in Australian history.
In June 2006, Knight appeal
ed the life sentence, claiming that a penalty of life in jail without possibility of parole was too severe for the killing. Justices Peter McClellan
, Michael Adams and Megan Latham dismissed the appeal in the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal in September, with Justice McClellan writing in his judgement "This was an appalling crime, almost beyond contemplation in a civilized society."
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n woman to be sentenced to life imprisonment
Life imprisonment
Life imprisonment is a sentence of imprisonment for a serious crime under which the convicted person is to remain in jail for the rest of his or her life...
without parole. She was convicted of the murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
of her partner, John Charles Thomas Price (born 6 January 1955) in October 2001, and is currently detained in Mulawa Correctional Centre
Mulawa Correctional Centre
The Silverwater Women's Correctional Centre is an Australian female prison facility located in Holker Street Silverwater, a suburb from the Sydney city center. It is located within the Silverwater Correctional Centre which houses male prisoners and other facilities...
now known as Silverwater women's prison.
Family
Originally from the town of AberdeenAberdeen, New South Wales
Aberdeen is a small town in the upper Hunter Valley region of New South Wales, Australia, in Upper Hunter Shire. It is located about 12 kilometres north of Muswellbrook on the New England Highway. Aberdeen is named after Aberdeen, Scotland. At the 2006 census, Aberdeen had a population of...
in New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
' Hunter Valley
Hunter Valley
The Hunter Region, more commonly known as the Hunter Valley, is a region of New South Wales, Australia, extending from approximately to north of Sydney with an approximate population of 645,395 people. Most of the population of the Hunter Region lives within of the coast, with 55% of the entire...
, Barbara Roughan (Née
NEE
NEE is a political protest group whose goal was to provide an alternative for voters who are unhappy with all political parties at hand in Belgium, where voting is compulsory.The NEE party was founded in 2005 in Antwerp...
Thorley) was forced to move to Moree
Moree, New South Wales
Moree is a large town in Moree Plains Shire in northern New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the banks of the Mehi River in the centre of the rich black-soil plains....
after beginning a relationship with Ken Knight, a co-worker of her husband Jack Roughan. The Roughan and Knight families were both well known in the conservative rural town and the affair was a major scandal. Two of Roughan’s four children remained with their father while the two youngest were sent to live with an aunt in Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
.
Katherine Knight was the younger of twins born to Barbara and her de facto
De facto
De facto is a Latin expression that means "concerning fact." In law, it often means "in practice but not necessarily ordained by law" or "in practice or actuality, but not officially established." It is commonly used in contrast to de jure when referring to matters of law, governance, or...
partner Ken on 24 October 1955 in Tenterfield, New South Wales
Tenterfield, New South Wales
Tenterfield is a town in New South Wales, Australia. It is located in the New England region at the intersection of the New England and Bruxner Highways. Tenterfield is a three-hour drive from Brisbane, 2.5 hours from Byron Bay, two hours from Armidale, New South Wales and 10 hours from Sydney....
. Jack Roughan died in 1959 and the two children who had lived with him moved in with the Knight family. Barbara’s grandmother was apparently an Indigenous Australian from the Moree area who had married an Irishman. She was proud of this fact and liked to think of her own family as Aboriginal. This was kept a family secret, as there was considerable racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
in the area at the time and this was a source of tension for the children. Apart from her twin, the only person Knight was close to was her uncle Oscar Knight who was a champion horseman
Rodeo
Rodeo is a competitive sport which arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain, Mexico, and later the United States, Canada, South America and Australia. It was based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States,...
. She was devastated when he committed suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
in 1969 and continues to maintain that his ghost visits her. The family moved back to Aberdeen the same year.
Early life
Knight’s father Ken was an alcoholic who openly used violence and intimidation to rape her mother up to ten times a day. Barbara in turn often told her daughters intimate details of her sex life and how much she hated sex and men (Later, when Knight complained to her mother that one of her partners wanted her to take part in a sex act she didn’t want to do, Barbara told her to "put up with it and stop complaining"). Knight claims she was frequently sexually abused by several members of her family (though not by her father), which continued until she was 11. Although they have minor doubts about the details, psychiatrists accept her claim as all her family members confirmed the abuse did happen.Katherine was by all accounts a pleasant girl who experienced uncontrollably murderous rages in response to minor upsets. When she attended Muswellbrook
Muswellbrook, New South Wales
Muswellbrook, a corruption of 'Muscle Brook', is a town and Local Government Area in New South Wales, Australia. The original spelling and etymology of the town's name is a matter of some debate...
high school, she became a loner and is remembered by classmates as a bully who stood over smaller children. She assaulted at least one boy at school with a weapon and was once injured by a teacher who was found to have acted in self-defense. By contrast, when not in a rage Knight was a model student and often earned awards for her good behavior. On leaving school at 15, without having learned to read or write, she gained employment as a cutter in a clothing factory. Twelve months later she left to start what she referred to as her "dream job", cutting up offal
Offal
Offal , also called, especially in the United States, variety meats or organ meats, refers to the internal organs and entrails of a butchered animal. The word does not refer to a particular list of edible organs, which varies by culture and region, but includes most internal organs other than...
at the local abattoir from where she was quickly promoted to boning and given her own set of butcher knives
Butcher knife
A butcher knife is a knife designed and used primarily for the butchering and/or dressing of animals.During the late 18th century to mid 1840s, the butcher knife was a key tool for mountain men. Simple, useful and cheap to produce, they were used for everything from skinning beaver, cutting food,...
. At home she hung the knives over her bed so that they "would always be handy if I needed them", a habit she continued - until her incarceration - everywhere she lived.
David Kellett
Katherine first met hard drinking co-worker David Stanford Kellett in 1973 and completely dominated him, if Kellett got into a fight at the hotel Knight would step in and back him up with her fists without fail. In Aberdeen she was renowned for offering armed combat to anyone who upset her.Knight married Kellett in 1974, at her request, with the couple arriving at the service on her motorcycle with a very intoxicated Kellett on the pillion
Pillion
A pillion is a mostly British English term for a secondary pad, cushion, or seat behind the main seat or saddle on a horse, motorcycle, bicycle or moped...
. As soon as they arrived Knight’s mother Barbara gave Kellett some advice:
"The old girl said to me to watch out. 'You better watch this one or she'll fucking kill you. Stir her up the wrong way or do the wrong thing and you're fucked, don't ever think of playing up on her, she'll fuckin' kill you.' And that was her mother talking! She told me she's got something loose, She's got a screw loose somewhere."On their wedding night she tried to strangle him. Knight explained it was because he fell asleep after only having intercourse three times.
The marriage was particularly violent and on one occasion a heavily pregnant Knight burned all Kellet's clothing and shoes before hitting him across the back of the head with a frying pan
Frying pan
A frying pan, frypan, or skillet is a flat-bottomed pan used for frying, searing, and browning foods. It is typically in diameter with relatively low sides that flare outwards, a long handle, and no lid. Larger pans may have a small grab handle opposite the main handle...
, simply because he had arrived home late from a darts
Darts
Darts is a form of throwing game where darts are thrown at a circular target fixed to a wall. Though various boards and games have been used in the past, the term "darts" usually now refers to a standardised game involving a specific board design and set of rules...
competition after making the finals. In fear for his life, Kellet fled before collapsing in a neighbors house and he was later treated for a badly fractured skull. Police wanted to charge her but Knight was now on her best behaviour and talked Kellet into dropping the charges. In May 1976, shortly after the birth of their first child, Melissa Ann, Kellett left her for another woman and moved to Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
. The next day Knight was seen pushing her new baby in a pram
Baby transport
Baby transport consists of devices for transporting and carrying infants. A "child carrier" or "baby carrier" is a device used to carry an infant or small child on the body of an adult...
down the main street, violently throwing the pram from side to side. Knight was admitted to St Elmo's Hospital in Tamworth
Tamworth, New South Wales
Tamworth is a city in the New England region of New South Wales, Australia. Straddling the Peel River, Tamworth, which contains an estimated population of 47,595 people, is the major regional centre for southern New England and in the local government area of Tamworth Regional Council. The city...
where she was diagnosed with postnatal depression and spent several weeks recovering. After being released, Knight placed two month old Melissa on a railway line shortly before the train was due, then stole an axe, went into town and threatened to kill several people. A man known in the district as "Old Ted", who was foraging near the railway line, found and rescued Melissa, by all accounts only minutes before the train passed. Knight was arrested and again taken to St Elmo's Hospital but, apparently recovered, signed herself out the following day.
A few days later Knight slashed the face of a woman with one of her knives and demanded she drive her to Queensland to find Kellett. The woman escaped after they stopped at a service station
Filling station
A filling station, also known as a fueling station, garage, gasbar , gas station , petrol bunk , petrol pump , petrol garage, petrol kiosk , petrol station "'servo"' in Australia or service station, is a facility which sells fuel and lubricants...
but by the time police arrived Knight had taken a little boy hostage and was threatening him with the knife. She was disarmed when police attacked her with brooms and she was admitted to the Morisset
Morisset, New South Wales
Morisset is a commercial centre and suburb of the City of Lake Macquarie in New South Wales, Australia, and is located west of Lake Macquarie just off the Sydney-Newcastle Freeway.-History:...
Psychiatric Hospital. Knight told the nurses she had intended to kill the mechanic at the service station because he had repaired Kellett’s car, which had allowed him to leave, and then kill both her husband and his mother when she arrived in Queensland. When police informed Kellett of the incident he left his girlfriend and along with his mother, they both moved to Aberdeen to support her.
Knight was released on 9 August 1976 into the care of her mother-in-law and along with Kellett, they now moved to Woodridge
Woodridge, Queensland
Woodridge is a suburb of Logan City in the South East of Queensland, Australia, located within the Brisbane metropolitan area and had a population of 18,039 as of the 1996 census....
, a suburb of Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
, where she obtained a job at the Dinmore meatworks in nearby Ipswich
City of Ipswich
The City of Ipswich is a Local Government Area in South East Queensland, covering an area of along the coast about southwest of Brisbane, the capital of Queensland. The City of Ipswich has a population of 162,380 .-History:...
. On 6 March 1980, they had another daughter, Natasha Maree. In 1984 Knight left Kellett and moved in, first with her parents in Aberdeen, then to a rented house in nearby Muswellbrook. Although she returned to work at the abattoir, she injured her back the following year and went on a disability pension. No longer needing to rent accommodation close to her work the government gave her a Housing Commission house in Aberdeen.
David Saunders
Knight met 38-year-old miner David Saunders in 1986. A few months later he moved in with her and her two daughters although he kept his old apartment in SconeScone, New South Wales
Scone is a town in the Upper Hunter Shire in the Hunter Valley region of New South Wales, Australia. At the 2006 census, Scone had a population of 4,624 people. It is located on the New England Highway north of Muswellbrook about 270 kilometres north of Sydney, and is part of the Hunter and Upper...
. Knight soon became jealous regarding what he did when she was not around and would often throw him out. He would move back to his apartment in Scone and then she would invariably follow and beg him to return. In May 1987 she cut the throat of his two-month-old dingo
Dingo
The Australian Dingo or Warrigal is a free-roaming wild dog unique to the continent of Australia, mainly found in the outback. Its original ancestors are thought to have arrived with humans from southeast Asia thousands of years ago, when dogs were still relatively undomesticated and closer to...
pup in front of him for no more reason than as an example of what would happen if he ever had an affair before going on to knock him unconscious with a frying pan. In June 1988 she gave birth to her third daughter Sarah, which prompted Saunders to put a deposit on a house, which Knight paid off when her workers' compensation
Workers' compensation
Workers' compensation is a form of insurance providing wage replacement and medical benefits to employees injured in the course of employment in exchange for mandatory relinquishment of the employee's right to sue his or her employer for the tort of negligence...
came through in 1989. Knight decorated the house throughout with animal skins, skulls, rusty animal traps, leather jackets, old boots, rakes and pitchforks. No space, including the ceilings, was left uncovered. After an argument where she hit Saunders in the face with an iron
Iron (appliance)
A clothes iron, also referred to as simply an iron, is a small appliance used in ironing to remove wrinkles from fabric.Ironing works by loosening the ties between the long chains of molecules that exist in polymer fiber materials. With the heat and the weight of the ironing plate, the fibers are...
before stabbing him in the stomach with a pair of scissors, he moved back to Scone, but when he later returned home found she had cut up all his clothes. Saunders took long service leave
Long service leave
Long service leave is an additional employee vacation payable after long periods of service with an employer in Australia and New Zealand.In Australia, unlike many other countries, employees are generally entitled to additional leave, known as long service leave, over and above their annual leave...
and went into hiding. Knight tried to find him but no one admitted to knowing where he was. Several months later he returned to see his daughter and found that Knight had gone to the police and told them she was afraid of him. They issued her with an Apprehended Violence Order (AVO) against him.
John Chillingworth
In 1990 Knight became pregnant by a 43-year-old former abattoir co-worker, John Chillingworth and gave birth the following year to a boy they named Eric. Their relationship lasted three years before she left him for a man she had been having an affair with for some time, John Price.John Price
John "Pricey" Price was the father of three children when Knight had an affair with him. Reputedly a "terrific bloke" liked by everyone who knew him, his own marriage had ended in 1988. While his two-year-old daughter had remained with his former wife, the two older children lived with him. Price was well aware of Knight's violent reputation and she moved into his house in 1995. His children liked her, he was making a lot of money working in the local mines and, apart from violent arguments, at first "life was a bunch of roses".In 1998 they had a fight over Price’s refusal to marry her and in retaliation Knight videotaped items he had stolen from work and sent the tape to his boss. Although the items were out of date
Shelf life
Shelf life is the length of time that food, drink, medicine, chemicals, and many other perishable items are given before they are considered unsuitable for sale, use, or consumption...
medical kits that he had scavenged from the company rubbish tip
Landfill
A landfill site , is a site for the disposal of waste materials by burial and is the oldest form of waste treatment...
, Price was fired from the job he had held for 17 years. That same day he kicked her out and she returned to her own home while news of what she had done spread through the town.
A few months later Price restarted the relationship although he now refused to allow her to move in with him. The fighting became even more frequent and most of his friends would no longer have anything to do with him while they remained together.
Price's Murder
In February 2000, a series of assaults on Price culminated with Knight stabbingStabbing
A stabbing is penetration with a sharp or pointed object at close range. Stab connotes purposeful action, as by an assassin or murderer, but it is also possible to accidentally stab oneself or others.Stabbing differs from slashing or cutting in that the motion of the object used in a stabbing...
Price in the chest. Finally fed up, he kicked her out of his house. On 29 February he stopped at the Scone Magistrate's Court on his way to work and took out an AVO
Restraining order
A restraining order or order of protection is a form of legal injunction that requires a party to do, or to refrain from doing, certain acts. A party that refuses to comply with an order faces criminal or civil penalties and may have to pay damages or accept sanctions...
to keep her away from both himself and his children. That afternoon Price told his co-workers that if he did not come to work the next day, it would be because Knight had killed him. They pleaded with him not to go home but he told them that he believed she would kill his children if he did not. Price arrived home to find that Knight, although not there herself, had sent the children away for a sleep-over at a friend's house. He then spent the evening with his neighbors before going to bed at 11pm. Earlier that day, Knight had bought new black lingerie
Lingerie
Lingerie are fashionable and possibly alluring undergarments.Lingerie usually incorporates one or more flexible, stretchy materials like Lycra, nylon , polyester, satin, lace, silk and sheer fabric which are not typically used in more functional, basic cotton undergarments.The term in the French...
and had videotaped all her children while making comments which have since been interpreted as a crude will
Will (law)
A will or testament is a legal declaration by which a person, the testator, names one or more persons to manage his/her estate and provides for the transfer of his/her property at death...
. Knight later arrived at Price's house while he was sleeping and sat watching TV for a few minutes before having a shower. She then woke Price and they had sex after which he fell asleep.
At 6am the next morning the neighbor became concerned that Price's car was still in the driveway and when Price did not arrive at work, his employer sent a worker to see what was wrong. Both the neighbor and worker tried knocking on Price's bedroom window to wake him but after noticing blood on the front door alerted the police who arrived at 8am. Breaking down the back door police found his body with Knight comatose from taking a large number of pills. She had stabbed Price with a butcher's knife while he was sleeping. According to the blood evidence, he awoke and tried to turn the light on before attempting to escape while Knight chased him through the house, he managed to open the front door and get outside but either stumbled back inside or was dragged back into the hallway where he finally died after bleeding out. Later, Knight went into Aberdeen and withdrew $1,000 from Price's ATM
Automated teller machine
An automated teller machine or automatic teller machine, also known as a Cashpoint , cash machine or sometimes a hole in the wall in British English, is a computerised telecommunications device that provides the clients of a financial institution with access to financial transactions in a public...
account. Price's autopsy
Autopsy
An autopsy—also known as a post-mortem examination, necropsy , autopsia cadaverum, or obduction—is a highly specialized surgical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a corpse to determine the cause and manner of death and to evaluate any disease or injury that may be present...
revealed that he had been stabbed at least 37 times, in both the front and back of his body with many of the wounds extending into vital organs
Organ (anatomy)
In biology, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in structural unit to serve a common function. Usually there is a main tissue and sporadic tissues . The main tissue is the one that is unique for the specific organ. For example, main tissue in the heart is the myocardium, while sporadic are...
. Several hours after Price had died, Knight skinned him and hung the skin from a meat hook on the architrave
Architrave
An architrave is the lintel or beam that rests on the capitals of the columns. It is an architectural element in Classical architecture.-Classical architecture:...
of a door to the lounge room. She then decapitated
Decapitation
Decapitation is the separation of the head from the body. Beheading typically refers to the act of intentional decapitation, e.g., as a means of murder or execution; it may be accomplished, for example, with an axe, sword, knife, wire, or by other more sophisticated means such as a guillotine...
him and cooked parts of his body, serving up the meat with baked potato, pumpkin, zucchini, cabbage, yellow squash and gravy in two settings at the dinner table, along with notes beside each plate, each having the name of one of Price's children on it; she was preparing to serve his body parts to his children.
A third meal was thrown on the back lawn for unknown reasons and it is speculated Knight had attempted to eat it but could not and this has been put forward in support of her claim that she has no memory of the crime. Price's head was found in a pot with vegetables. The pot was still warm, estimated to be at between 40 and 50 degrees Celsius, indicating that the cooking had taken place in the early morning. Sometime later Knight arranged the body with the left arm draped over an empty 1.25 litre soft drink bottle with the legs crossed. This was claimed in court to be an act of defilement demonstrating Knight’s contempt for Price. Knight had left a hand written note on top of a photograph of Price. Blood stained and covered with small pieces of flesh the note read:
Time got you back Johathon for rappingThe accusations in the note were found to be groundless.RapeRape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
[raping] my douterDaughterA daughter is a female offspring; a girl, woman, or female animal in relation to her parents. The male equivalent is a son. Analogously the name is used on several areas to show relations between groups or elements.-Etymology:...
[daughter]. You to Beck [Price's daughter] for Ross — for Little John [his son]. Now play with little Johns DickPenisThe penis is a biological feature of male animals including both vertebrates and invertebrates...
John Price. (sic)
Trial
Knight's initial offer to plead guilty to manslaughterManslaughter
Manslaughter is a legal term for the killing of a human being, in a manner considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is said to have first been made by the Ancient Athenian lawmaker Dracon in the 7th century BC.The law generally differentiates...
was rejected and she was arraigned
Arraignment
Arraignment is a formal reading of a criminal complaint in the presence of the defendant to inform the defendant of the charges against him or her. In response to arraignment, the accused is expected to enter a plea...
on 2 February 2001 on the charge of murdering Price, to which she entered a plea
Plea
In legal terms, a plea is simply an answer to a claim made by someone in a civil or criminal case under common law using the adversary system. Colloquially, a plea has come to mean the assertion by a criminal defendant at arraignment, or otherwise in response to a criminal charge, whether that...
of not guilty. Her trial was initially fixed for 23 July 2001 but was adjourned due to her counsel's illness and it was re-fixed for 15 October 2001.
When the trial commenced, Justice Barry O'Keefe offered the 60 jury prospects the option of being excused due to the nature of the photographic evidence which five accepted. When the witness list was read out to the prospects several more also dropped out after which the jury was empanelled. Knight's attorneys then spoke to the judge who adjourned to the following day; the next morning, Knight changed her plea to guilty, and the jury was dismissed. It was now made public that Justice O'Keefe had been advised of the plea change the day before. He had adjourned the trial and then ordered a psychiatric assessment overnight to determine if Knight understood the consequences of a guilty plea and was fit to make such a plea. Knight's legal team had planned to defend Knight by claiming amnesia
Amnesia
Amnesia is a condition in which one's memory is lost. The causes of amnesia have traditionally been divided into categories. Memory appears to be stored in several parts of the limbic system of the brain, and any condition that interferes with the function of this system can cause amnesia...
and dissociation
Dissociation
Dissociation is an altered state of consciousness characterized by partial or complete disruption of the normal integration of a person’s normal conscious or psychological functioning. Dissociation is most commonly experienced as a subjective perception of one's consciousness being detached from...
, a claim supported by most psychiatrists although they did consider her sane.
No reason has ever been given for the guilty plea, and despite giving it, Knight still refused to accept responsibility for her actions. At the sentencing hearing, Knight's lawyers requested that Knight be excused to avoid hearing some of the facts, but the application was refused. When Dr. Timothy Lyons took the stand and described the skinning and decapitation, Knight became hysterical and had to be sedated.
On 8 November, Justice O'Keefe pointed out that the nature of the crime and Knight's lack of remorse required a severe penalty; he sentenced her to life imprisonment, refused to fix a non-parole period and ordered that her papers be marked "never to be released", the first time that this had been imposed on a woman in Australian history.
In June 2006, Knight appeal
Appeal
An appeal is a petition for review of a case that has been decided by a court of law. The petition is made to a higher court for the purpose of overturning the lower court's decision....
ed the life sentence, claiming that a penalty of life in jail without possibility of parole was too severe for the killing. Justices Peter McClellan
Peter McClellan
Peter David McClellan, AM, is the Chief Judge at Common Law of the Supreme Court of New South Wales, the highest court in the State of New South Wales, Australia, which forms part of the Australian court hierarchy. He was appointed to the position in 2005....
, Michael Adams and Megan Latham dismissed the appeal in the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal in September, with Justice McClellan writing in his judgement "This was an appalling crime, almost beyond contemplation in a civilized society."
Links
- R v Knight (2001)
- Australian crime Documentary Beyond The Darkland aired an episode on Katherine Knight on 9 June 2009- link to the full episode