A 90-year-old man has been spared jailed after stabbing his blind and ailing wife of more than 60 years.
Retired butcher Edward Turpin got a carving knife from the kitchen and attacked Joan Turpin in bed at their home in Orpington, Kent, on September 22 last year. Afterwards, he called 999 and told the operator: “I don’t want to stop the bleeding. We want to die.”
While refusing to take direction over the phone, he urged emergency services to “hurry up”, the Old Bailey was told. Jurors heard Mrs Turpin, who has lost her eyesight, suffers diabetes and needs a catheter, had become increasingly dependent on her husband’s help before the attack.
