Murder or manslaughter

Walk a mile in the other woman's shoes before you judge her !!!!

She's out, and I for one am glad.

That's all.

I had sympathy with her before I viewed the documentary and still had some after I had watched it. However, I thought it was premeditated and was murder, though I understand it was because of her mental illness that it became manslaughter. I didn't find her an attractive personality.

To Moggie57
I am not a strict follower of Sally Challen. I believe she done 8 or 9 years in Bronzefield Prison after being found guilty of murdering her husband.

High up people who deal with this sort of thing took on her case and went for a retrial or something to that effect and using new evidence she was set free from prison.
I just happened to be watching the t.v. one evening when the documentary was aired and it was fairly interesting, personally I am not any sort of expert on that sort of thing it could be anyone's guess to the woman's state of mind hope she can lead some sort of life and move on with her sons.

No extenuating circumstances then moggie57

bring me up to date on this i dont have a tv. but anyone who kills anyone whether intentionally or not is murder.

I heard about the Sally Challen case and without knowing much I felt she must have been another abused woman that just snapped after perhaps years of mental and physical abuse with the outcome being that she killed her husband before he killed her.
When I watched the documentary it surprised me to see that the family had lived a privileged lifestyle and financially had no problems as do many of the battered woman that flee to refuges so the theory that all domestic crimes are just down to more middle class people is not entirely true.
Sally must have been so co-dependant on him to even think of wanting a reconciliation especially as she had left him and could easily have began a new life.
One of the sons was very emotionally distressed about everything I hope he had the right sort of professional help to come to terms with things.
She's done her time let's hope she can rebuild her life.

I agree with Smiless2012 and other posters sympathetic to the case.
Actually I think both Sally and her husband were mentally ill.
He was extraordinarily cruel and abusive.
Sending Christmas cards to friends and neighbours of him sitting on a car bonnet with two practically nude women was absolutely bizarre.
What kind of message did that send to their sons?
Sally is obviously still ill...she believes she still loves him.
The while case is so sad...but coercive control has now been passed into law as a defence, and so it should be.

It's referred too as 'battered wife syndrome' and if the reports in connection to her state of mind had been presented at the original trial, the verdict may well have been different.

if they were separated for a year then she went looking for him with a hammer then it should be murder, but they argue a battered woman suffers from the equivalent to a battle syndrome where they live in fear all the time, so maybe that's the illness they put forward in court

How many who manage to leave their abusive partner, spend the rest of their lives living in fear and looking over their shoulder, for fear of being found again?

It's unusual for women to kill with such violence, which surely says a lot about this poor woman's state of mind.

She met age just 16...far too young.
She could not face life without him, she had left him was living somewhere else but he was playing with her.
He was lying to her.
It wasn't so simple.

Abusers blow hot and cold. One moment they are apologising for their actions the next they claim it is the other persons fault. The lady was familiar with this and if as stated she went to discuss reconciliation she would not know how he would re act based on her experience of this man. Her mental state after years of abuse would have been taken into consideration.

This surely has got to be a hard one to judge. Unless you know the absolute ins and outs of it.
On the surface years of abuse becomes the norm for lots of women, very destructive on the self, so I can see how someone would snap when they see no other way out.
So as Sally has been a victim I think she deserves a bit of peace and a second chance of life.
In a perfect world she should have left and restarted again. But would he have gone on to abuse another? Rather than rightings his wrong ways.

I empathise with her to a degree having suffered mental and physical abuse in my previous marriage. I was so tempted once when a sharp knife was on the worktop within easy reach, but the thought of my children stopped me. There were no refuges then and the police didn’t recognise domestic violence. I’d have got life. I would say, that in my case, separation didn’t stop the abuse. It came in other forms, so the fact she lived apart from him was probably irrelevant. Taking a hammer though? I might have done for self defence.

oopsminty
He anally raped her several times. Her words.

I suspect she was suffering from post traumatic stress disorder and as has rightly been pointed out she was not “in her right mind” .For murder to be an appropriate charge, the accused has to have culpable intent; she may have had intent to kill, but she did not have culpable intent, because the balance of her mind was disturbed and therefore she was rightly convicted of manslaughter in my opinion.
As others have pointed out years of psychological and emotional abuse will have long term damage to the victim including the onset of PTSD and other mental health problems.

The trouble with abuse is that it causes you to question yourself. You are told continually that whatever "punishment" you receive, it is your fault. If you hadn't done something then they, the abuser, wouldn't have had to act that way. You get into a pattern of continually questioning your own actions and after a time, you become convinced that you could have controlled the situation better. Consequently, when you part and things go wrong, you do miss the abuser who has normally controlled everything. I can absolutely see why she thought she wanted him back. You may have to be out of the situation for many years before you become independent of that sort of person and some women never manage it.

Did she perhaps take the hammer in case she might need it if he became abusive? When my DH became physically aggressive due to dementia, I sometimes had a rolling pin under my pillow.

I agree with Smiless2012.

@EllanVannin pretty sure no one was excusing her actions?Quite important to recognise mental health under diminished responsibility if we're to learn anything.

Umm..she's already out, after having served 8 or 9 years of her murder sentence.

She was given 22 for murder - probably would have been out in 15 or do anyway.

Sentences are so short it probably makes little difference.

The test is, “ is she a threat to others or society in general”
As she had been provoked for years it is manslaughter no doubt.
There will be a custodial sentence but not very long.

I've every sympathy for her state of mind, but still think that premeditated killing is murder.