Cheeky Wife

A poet lured her husband into woodland for a drug-fuelled sex session and then slit his throat. And they say romance is dead...

Joanne Hale left husband Peter for dead so she could see a man she had met on the internet. That can't be less messy than a divorce. Hale gave her a spouse a dose of the natural aphrodisiac called 'horny goat weed' before she blindfolded him and led him into local woods to act out her fantasy. The couple kissed and 'rolled about on the leaves' as part of a 'playful game'.

Hale sat astride her victim as he lay face-down on the ground and slit his throat with a knife, before plunging it into his neck and chest several times. She abandoned his bleeding body when she was disturbed by a passer-by, and then drove to rendezvous with a man she had befriended on the web. Police arrested her when she returned home.

She denies attempted murder and wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, though her husband disagrees quite strongly. Hale publishes her poetry on the internet and, according to her website, likes to write verse about 'people, animals, love and everything that people care about'. There was no mention of wanting to kill or have online affairs.

The couple, who married in 2000, were watching television last December when Mrs Hale suggested her husband take 'horny goat weed'. Mr Hale told a jury that he and his wife discussed how to prepare the drug - and that a mask used to relieve headaches was put over his face. They left their home in Bristol, and walked to Stoke Park in the dark. 'We had a cuddle and a bit of rolling about in the leaves,' he said. 'I was happy at that point.' Translation: erection. He said his memory was 'hazy' from this point onwards. That's what happens when you lose a lot of blood.

She is said to have then driven to Bristol Parkway railway-station where she had arranged to pick up postal worker Philip Sudol. Hale allegedly told Mr Sudol, whom she was meeting in person for the first time, that she was separated, but that her husband had injured himself and she would get the blame. Smart...get that alibi ready.The Hales were said to have been affected by stress after Mr Hale 'totally messed up' his PhD studies. Who knows what that means in the English school system, but to add insult to patheticness, he was also due to be made redundant at work. The trial continues...