Hereford attacker Samantha Smith jailed for frenzied attack on partner

Samantha Smith, 56, launched the frenzied attack at the home of her boyfriend as she pinned him down on the bed armed with two knives.

It left the victim, a 59-year-old man, with life-threatening injuries as he was blue-lighted to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham with a doctor on board.

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Armed with the two kitchen knives, Smith had stabbed the victim 29 times to the chest and stomach. The attack included "trying to saw his head off" with a serrated bread knife and leaving a 10-centimetre cut, prosecution barrister Jennifer Josephs told Worcester Crown Court.

The pair, who Miss Josephs said were alcoholics and had known each other for more than 40 years, had spent the day drinking lager and Jack Daniels, a drink Smith had not tried before.

But Miss Josephs said Smith jumped on top of the victim as he lay on his bed at the Rothesay Mead flat on July 3, 2022, with the relationship said to be "destructive".

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In a victim personal statement, the man said he struggles to sleep and freezes when he has to use a knife in the kitchen. He has also been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

A police car at the scene of the attempted murder in Rothesay Mead, Hereford

Once the victim was able to phone 999, the police arrested Smith and she admitted what she had done, but has never been able to say why she did it.

It was a spontaneous attack, judge James Burbidge KC, honorary recorder of Worcester, said, and he questioned if Smith was a "dangerous" offender. He decided he could "not say with any certainty" she would be dangerous in the future.

Defence barrister Francesca Levett said Smith had mental health issues, including post-traumatic stress disorder, and she has begun to identify the route causes of her problems – and she was "mortified" at what she had done.

She said the knife had not been taken to the scene, only collected from the victim's kitchen, it was not pre-meditated and she accepted full responsibility.

Her behaviour was said to be "alien" and the "frenzied" attack was "very out of character", Ms Levett said as she added it would "never happen again".

Smith, who pleaded guilty to one count of attempted murder, was sentenced to 12 years in prison and the judge said she had attacked the victim "ferociously" and had "tried to remove his head".

He took her mental health into account while deciding the sentence, and told Smith, of Waterfield Road, she could expect to serve at two-thirds of her sentence before being eligible for release on licence.