Penelope Jackson murder trial

Ilovecheese

No, of course not all men are bad, nobody has suggested that at all. But the two men who got five years and four years for murder were believed, why are women not believed.

Women are believed it is just this particular one that is not and if we had sat through the trial we would probably know why she was not believed.

Nobody is excusing what she did.
Some people are shocked at the sentence.

There is no excuse for what she did. She was no victim, she gave as good as she got even he4 daughter said that. They sound a very unsavoury couple, but what she did to her previous husband, the father of their children, telling them their father had died, clearing the house, leaving him broken, was inexcusable and cruel. She had a history of leaving husbands and volatile behaviour. Why didn’t she just leave him like she did the others?

Some are ok.
I couldn't eat a whole one, though.

nobody even said all men were bad

No, of course not all men are bad, nobody has suggested that at all. But the two men who got five years and four years for murder were believed, why are women not believed.

No, they're not all bad, but those that are rarely have an epiphany and change personality.

But here is the quandary. A woman kills her husband/boyfriend. Claims domestic abuse. Very difficult to dispute. But we can't just automatically believe the woman. That's just wrong. Same way we can't always believe a man who excuses his crimes for domestic abuse. It doesn't work that way.

I know plenty about domestic abuse. I've been hospitalised as a result of domestic abuse. It's awful.

But I don't always believe everything that people say. Because people do lie.

I'm not supporting men who are violent. But I'm not going to condemn every man as an abuser either.

We all have fathers, brothers, son, grandsons. Men aren't all bad

So he somehow got better in the 20 years?
Saw the error of his ways and decided to become a nice man instead?

I'm not for one minute defending the crime that was committed, or bemoaning the punishment for it.
I'm just aghast at how people will try and justify abusive behaviour when it is done to women.

humptydumpty

The incidents where the daughter witnessed violence from her father took place around 1997 or 1998 so over 20 years ago. I have every sympathy with abused wives, but it's easy to bring out that defence - people seem too keen not to believe that she is just a killer.

does it matter how long ago it was? as she would not have been living with him to witness anything over the past 20 years, surely?

She was obviously a killer as she killed him, that isn't in dispute

The incidents where the daughter witnessed violence from her father took place around 1997 or 1998 so over 20 years ago. I have every sympathy with abused wives, but it's easy to bring out that defence - people seem too keen not to believe that she is just a killer.

Yes. So external accounts. HIS brother, the daughter.

Those killers were believed.
Yes, and that is horrifying and wrong.

Calistemon

And he's not here to give his side of the story or defend himself.

Neither are the women who died during 'rough sex' able to say, 'Actually, no. He got carried away and killed me.' Those killers were believed. Yet here we have a woman with witnesses to his violence who is STILL not believed.

And he's not here to give his side of the story or defend himself.

Lucca

The victims brother has defended Penelope saying his brother was abusive basically.

Yes. So external accounts. HIS brother, the daughter.

Lucca

The victims brother has defended Penelope saying his brother was abusive basically.

The same brother who had a difficult relationship with him due to inheritance arguments.

We'll never know what happened. We won't know who was the main protagonist. But we know the end result.

The victims brother has defended Penelope saying his brother was abusive basically.

JaneJudge, not a garbled post at all. The Freedom Project was a great organisation in the city I worked in. Some women were re-referred more than once.
Reading the comments on this thread shows the divide that still exists between women with work and/or personal experience of domestic abuse.

I'm sorry if some of you think I went off topic a bit I am just mindful that not everyone understands how abuse works. I had to do the freedom program for my previous job and a lady did a talk about her own experience of abuse. She said her husband used to lock her in the house and take her shoes and coat, so even if she could leave via window, she would have nothing on her feet. Recently I was reminded of this as my Mum mentioned a friend had turned up at her house and 'seemed a bit confused' and she then went on to mention her friend had not got her false teeth in and was wearing impractical footwear. It happened twice that week. Now my Mum worked in an establishment that had a safe space for DV so had received training but it still hadn't occurred to her that her home may have been a place of safety for this woman. When I mentioned it my Mum mentioned 'well they are old' 'and her husband isn't like that' but to me on the outside it seemed pretty worrying. I'm sorry for this garbled post but things are sometimes a bit more complicated than what we can see.

It seems to me they could have been a match for each other. Maybe both wanted control but had to constantly fight to get the upper hand, making them both abuser and abused. Over time this could push such a toxic relationship to the limit and lead to this incident, where she snapped and took the ultimate control by finishing him off. I don't believe she was the victim she says she was, because I think she gave as good as she got.

I would have thought they would do that to see if she was fit to stand trial.
She sounded to me as if she was at the end of her tether, but the details of why, well, who knows?
I think perhaps they were in that romanticised position of "can't live with eachother, can't live without".
That's another reason to get the out of those type of relationships, because they can seriously mess people up.

None of us know - and probably never will - what went on in that marriage. Was she the abuser or the abused? I have no idea. The daughter witnessed her father abusing her mother on 3 occasions, quite violently too, so obviously he was capable of abuse. However, we don't know the circumstances surrounding these incidents... did he snap because she was abusing him, or was he simply being abusive?

Judging by her bizarre behaviour when talking to the emergency services and during her subsequent arrest - I feel that she is actually suffering from some form of age related mental decline. She appears to have lost touch with reality. The sheer horror of the whole thing seems not to have impressed itself on her mind - it's as if she was in another world, and I really do believe she is not in a normal state of mind. Was this due to years of abuse which has affected her mental stability, or is she suffering from dementia?

I watched a close family member decline with dementia and this person often showed complete indifference to the suffering of others, as if it was completely beyond their comprehension. And this was a person who had been a very caring and empathetic individual.

I think she needs psychiatric evaluation.

I’ve followed the trial and read some recent summaries. My grannie would probably have commented these two are well suited, either one would spoil another couple.
This sounds to have been a toxic relationship, both partners emotionally abusive towards the other. The both drank heavily and the murder happened after a shared celebratory meal where it seems safe to assume drink was involved. It lowers inhibitions and drunken rows, put downs between this couple are mentioned in the media.
A word of thanks to JaneJudge, Miss Adventure and others whose posts give a more accurate picture of domestic abuse. It’s never as simple as ‘why didn’t she (or he) just leave”
I’ve seen no reference to psychiatric reports but assume there would have been at least one expert reporting. The 999 and police cam recorders don’t show a woman in control of herself. She killed him, a prison sentence would follow. 18 years is an extremely long sentence.
Women are still more likely to receive harsher sentences than men. Particularly when the commit crimes of violence.

Is this her

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracie_Andrews

Yes BlueBelle Tracey Andrews.
She concocted the road rage incident to explain it.
I'm in my element here; I'm very interested in crime.