Telford woman jailed for knifing her lover in Xmas present row

A 43-year-old Shropshire woman who pinned her lover to the floor with a knife after a row about a Christmas present has been jailed for three years.

Tracie Pearce, from Arleston Road in Telford, was sent to prison after she stabbed her boyfriend with a knife which went through his arm and pinned him to his kitchen floor in Scotland. Terrified William Dryburgh, 47, managed to pull the blade free.

He managed to crawl out of the house and call for help in December last year.

The stabbing at his home in East Lothian was the end of a romance which had begun over the internet, the High Court in Edinburgh heard.

Pearce had moved there five weeks earlier and the neighbours in Northfield, Tranent, heard frequent shouting matches accompanied by the sound of furniture being banged about.

Mr Charles Ferguson, for Pearce, told the court during Tuesday's hearing that Pearce had given up her home in Shropshire and felt increasingly isolated.

On one occasion she was standing in the snow in her bare feet and Mr Dryburgh was telling her to leave, he added.

Mr Andrew Brown, prosecuting, told the court how a parcel had arrived the day before the incident from Mr Dryburgh's former partner who is now in Australia, with money as a Christmas present for one of Mr Dryburgh's children – and Pearce became annoyed.

Mr Dryburgh told her to pack her bags, but agreed to let her stay overnight.

"She remained drunk and argumentative and both continued to shout at each other," said Mr Brown.

He described to the court how Mr Dryburgh went into the galley-type kitchen where Pearce was standing against the sink, saying nothing.

"He began to roll a cigarette when the accused suddenly raised a kitchen knife and brought it down with force.

"The accused managed to stab Mr Dryburgh very hard in the left forearm. The knife travelled right through the arm and went into the floor, pinning Mr Dryburgh to the ground."

When police arrested drunken Pearce she asked them: "Is he dead yet?"

Pearce pleaded guilty to a charge of assault to the danger of life.

The kitchen knife was described as five inches long and the blade was found to be badly bent.

Judge Lord Turnbull, jailing her, said she had used a knife to cause 'very significant injury' and a prison sentence was unavoidable.