Jessica Breeze weeps in dock after being acquitted of murder and manslaughter

This article is more than 7 months old

This article is more than 7 months old

A woman who stabbed her abusive father to death has been acquitted of his murder and manslaughter.

Jessica Breeze, 20, from Middlesbrough, denied murdering Colin Brady, 49, at their family home in June after a violent argument.

Breeze told Teesside crown court that “controlling” Brady had hit her and threatened to kill both her and her mother before the incident.

The nursery worker, who stabbed Brady in the back with a kitchen knife, was found not guilty of both charges on Monday. She wept in the dock as the verdict was read out.

Breeze had earlier described her father as “controlling”, and recalled how he would “smash the place up” if she returned home late.

Asked by her barrister, Simon Russell Flint QC, if she had ever reported her father’s abuse to the police, Breeze replied: “No. I was scared. I thought it was pointless.”

Brady died from blood loss at James Cook university hospital after suffering an 18cm-deep wound to his left lung.

He had previously been convicted for violence, including causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

A police officer described a past attack on Breeze’s mum, Kelly, as the worst domestic assault he had seen.

The court heard that on the night of Brady’s death, the family had been sharing a takeaway when an argument broke out after Breeze’s parents discovered she had been seeing her boyfriend when she said she had been at work.

Brady allegedly hit his then 19-year-old daughter several times before her mother intervened. Breeze told the jury: “He said he was going to kill us.”

The jury was told that he then picked up a knife and asked if the women wanted him to cut his own throat, before they fled upstairs.

Although the prosecution said Breeze stabbed her father in the back as he was leaving the house, she claimed to have “no memory of picking up the knife”.

In a statement read outside court, her solicitor, Sean Grainger, said the jury had accepted Breeze had been “acting in lawful self-defence of herself and her mother”.

“Further, whilst Jessica was brought up in a highly toxic home environment where she and her mother were regularly subject to extreme physical and emotional abuse by her father, Jessica wishes to make it clear she loved her father, she still does and she wishes he was still here.

“She now wishes to rebuild her life, get back to work and move on from the seven-month ordeal she has endured since her arrest.”

Following the verdict, a Crown Prosecution Service spokesperson said the murder charge against Breeze had been “wholly appropriate” considering the circumstances of Brady’s death.

“Regardless of the alleged provocation for the attack, the victim was attacked in the back as he walked away from the defendant,” they added.

“He was stabbed with such force that it passed from his back through his entire left lung and into his chest. Despite claims of self-defence by the defendant, the evidence was such that there was a case to answer.”