00:00:09
they appeared the perfect family living
00:00:11
happily in the pretty english market
00:00:13
town of aylesbury but behind the closed
00:00:16
doors a different more sinister story
00:00:18
years of systemic abuse and evidence of
00:00:21
a long slow murder
00:00:24
beatings with blunt objects blood spat
00:00:27
is found on the ceiling there was blood
00:00:28
found on the walls and blood found on
00:00:30
furniture because i was so angry with
00:00:32
him i punched him on his nose
00:00:35
there's no emotion as far as she's
00:00:36
concerned what she's done is rational
00:00:38
reasonable and she's just giving a
00:00:40
professional account of it did he cower
00:00:43
away from you was he scared of you
00:00:45
the donnelly marriage begins well but
00:00:48
there's will be no small town fairy tale
00:00:51
this was a totally callous woman who
00:00:54
physically abused her husband abuse
00:00:58
bullying
00:00:59
and coercive control she was evil
00:01:02
an abc of murder
00:01:07
[Music]
00:01:23
few pictures of the marriage of hannah
00:01:25
donnelly and her husband christopher
00:01:27
exist and none which have leaked into
00:01:29
the public domain
00:01:30
hanograft's image was though to become
00:01:33
familiar to oxfordshire police as they
00:01:35
probed what had happened within her
00:01:37
marriage by
00:01:38
2018. hannah grete was in her 50s and
00:01:42
she was married to christopher they've
00:01:44
been married since about 1992. they have
00:01:47
four children they both have successful
00:01:49
careers her as a midwife him as a
00:01:52
musician he'd worked as a music teacher
00:01:55
for a long time and performed as well he
00:01:57
was around the same age a year older
00:01:59
than his wife
00:02:02
[Music]
00:02:04
all the reports are that they lived a
00:02:06
very insular
00:02:08
existence
00:02:09
and really didn't associate with
00:02:10
neighbours or anything particularly such
00:02:12
as that
00:02:13
on paper christopher and hannah grete
00:02:15
donnelly appeared to have what many long
00:02:17
for
00:02:18
so on the face of it it's a very
00:02:20
normal almost wholesome family life but
00:02:24
at the heart of it
00:02:25
is this relationship that is far from
00:02:28
healthy
00:02:29
it's a relationship that is based on
00:02:31
hanagrit's absolute power
00:02:34
absolute power with an emphasis on
00:02:36
religion
00:02:40
they were a religious family with deeply
00:02:42
held beliefs
00:02:44
they apparently had some type of view
00:02:47
around there being an end of day's
00:02:49
existence
00:02:50
they shunned modern technology
00:02:52
theirs was a house with no phone no
00:02:55
internet and a family that didn't need a
00:02:58
school
00:02:59
teaching was to be hannahgrant's job it
00:03:01
is possible of course for families to be
00:03:03
very happy and self-sufficient to
00:03:05
homeschool their own children to
00:03:08
avoid the evils of the internet and
00:03:10
modern technology but it also makes it
00:03:13
much much more difficult for any
00:03:15
authorities to keep an eye on what's
00:03:17
going on and to raise concerns if they
00:03:21
see anything out of the ordinary so her
00:03:23
children we hear very little of they are
00:03:26
kept behind closed doors
00:03:29
the donnelly household is a very unusual
00:03:32
one hanagret has created
00:03:34
a household that's almost like a
00:03:36
separate land it's a land under her
00:03:38
dominion it's a land where she hanagaret
00:03:41
has absolute power and like any
00:03:45
territory under absolute dictatorial
00:03:47
control
00:03:48
it's one where she keeps a very firm
00:03:51
hold
00:03:52
on the infiltration of of any external
00:03:54
influences so there's there's no
00:03:56
technology allowed the children are
00:03:58
homeschooled it's not just a physical
00:04:00
but it's actually a psychological
00:04:02
fortress that she has created here
00:04:05
within your family what would you say
00:04:07
your role is
00:04:08
a fortress was exactly what hannah grete
00:04:10
wanted a dominion over which she had
00:04:12
complete control
00:04:14
i'd like to know what's going on
00:04:20
to be informed as to what is going on i
00:04:23
don't like
00:04:25
like my people talk behind my back and
00:04:29
a bit upset when i feel that there's
00:04:32
some sort of
00:04:34
things going on that that
00:04:36
i'm not told about
00:04:39
and when she got upset hannahgrant
00:04:41
became abusive violently so to her
00:04:43
husband what is clear here
00:04:46
is that the level of control
00:04:49
and the level of abuse
00:04:51
made this an almost everyday occurrence
00:04:55
a level of abuse that had simply become
00:04:58
accepted the actions here are
00:05:00
unquestionably the actions of an abuser
00:05:07
what's unusual is that that abuse does
00:05:08
not seem to be motivated as we might
00:05:10
expect by any kind of anger or hatred of
00:05:14
her victim but rather by an
00:05:16
unquestioning belief in her own absolute
00:05:19
authority
00:05:24
that absolute authority would cost
00:05:26
christopher dearly
00:05:28
hanagret waged a campaign of violence
00:05:30
which intensified between 2017 and 2018
00:05:34
when christopher became disabled unable
00:05:36
to walk and increasingly dependent on
00:05:38
his violent wife
00:05:40
a fact which appears to have triggered
00:05:41
hannahgret to further abuse christopher
00:05:45
i punched him on his nose
00:05:48
severely because i was so angry with him
00:05:50
but he didn't have such a big cut he
00:05:52
took he had just a small cut we know
00:05:55
that christopher stopped working as a
00:05:57
music teacher in 2015 due to ill health
00:06:00
and we can only assume that some of that
00:06:02
ill health was as a result of
00:06:04
hanagaret's treatment of him his mental
00:06:07
health began to suffer
00:06:09
and
00:06:10
what's particularly distressing about
00:06:12
this case is the knowledge that hanagret
00:06:15
was abusing her husband at the very time
00:06:17
when he needed her support so gradually
00:06:20
christopher became weaker not just
00:06:22
physically but mentally until he wasn't
00:06:25
able to defend himself at all
00:06:27
her husband
00:06:28
initially was a talented musician but
00:06:31
quite clearly over time became more and
00:06:33
more and more weak and became a shadow
00:06:36
of his former self it very much seems
00:06:38
that she was the one in charge whether
00:06:40
at the beginning of their relationship
00:06:42
there was ever any evenness is difficult
00:06:44
to know but certainly by the end he was
00:06:47
nothing more than a punching bag for her
00:06:50
what's interesting in this case is it
00:06:52
seems to me towards the end of his life
00:06:54
christopher became very very ill and
00:06:56
required an awful lot of care from his
00:06:58
wife
00:07:00
it's often the case that when that
00:07:02
happens the dynamic between a married
00:07:04
couple will change significantly
00:07:07
the fact that their health has failed to
00:07:08
so much that they're having to do
00:07:10
everything for them can cause an
00:07:11
enormous amount of resentment violence
00:07:14
within an abusive relationship rarely
00:07:15
stays the same experts agree that once a
00:07:19
line is crossed the violent partner
00:07:21
often tests how far they can push it
00:07:23
either escalating the ferocity of the
00:07:25
violence or the frequency of the attacks
00:07:28
creating a new and deeper level of power
00:07:31
and control over their victim
00:07:34
hanagaret's behaviour clearly escalated
00:07:37
over the years
00:07:39
and and in conjunction with that her
00:07:41
husband became weaker both physically
00:07:43
and mentally which meant that the effect
00:07:46
of what she was doing was exacerbated
00:07:50
during police interviews hannahgret
00:07:52
dismissed a lot of her behaviour as as
00:07:54
just banter she talked about chasing her
00:07:57
husband around a table she talked about
00:08:00
playfully hitting him with a rolling pin
00:08:04
it's arguable whether any of that is
00:08:06
indeed banter or playful behavior but
00:08:09
what is
00:08:10
certain is that her abuse got
00:08:13
significantly worse towards um towards
00:08:15
the end first of all i tried to sort of
00:08:19
sort things out with him in in sort of a
00:08:23
angering sort of way and so yeah if i
00:08:26
hit you with a rolling pin maybe you
00:08:27
come out of your trance also
00:08:31
[Music]
00:08:34
rolling pins are heavy objects and they
00:08:36
come down with very considerable force
00:08:39
they could easily break bones they could
00:08:42
easily break a skull and even cause
00:08:44
bleeding inside the brain with every
00:08:47
subsequent act of violence that she
00:08:49
inflicted upon her husband he was
00:08:51
weakened and therefore the next act of
00:08:53
violence became even more impactful was
00:08:55
even more uh powerful had an even more
00:08:58
powerful effect she reduced him over
00:09:01
time almost to the state of a wounded
00:09:03
animal
00:09:05
after 32 years of marriage christopher
00:09:08
was wounded weakened and trapped in a
00:09:10
house cut off from the outside world
00:09:13
there was nothing to stop hannahgret's
00:09:14
violence from intensifying
00:09:18
it hit him
00:09:19
a bit harder sometimes
00:09:24
for christopher a 55 year old man
00:09:28
to have been subjected to such abuse
00:09:30
which led to so much scar tissue that
00:09:33
even a home office pathologist was
00:09:36
shocked
00:09:45
march 31 2017 and oxfordshire emergency
00:09:48
services receive a call
00:09:50
the first that the emergency services
00:09:52
knew about christopher's death was when
00:09:55
they received a call from hannahgratt
00:09:57
using her neighbor's phone
00:09:59
to say that her husband had died the
00:10:01
night before when they attended they
00:10:03
found christopher clearly dead on the
00:10:06
bathroom floor with a significant number
00:10:09
of injuries
00:10:11
the post-mortem revealed that he'd
00:10:12
almost certainly died around 12 hours
00:10:14
previously but hannah grete hadn't
00:10:16
called the police until the following
00:10:18
day police and ambulance
00:10:20
i think turned up at the same time
00:10:22
and she admitted that she had assaulted
00:10:24
him at some point in the past and as a
00:10:27
result of that she was arrested
00:10:29
there was a head injury
00:10:30
and there were i think suggestions that
00:10:33
there was evidence of other injuries
00:10:36
that were perhaps slightly more historic
00:10:38
hanagrat told them that she had
00:10:39
attempted to revive her husband
00:10:42
there was a mystery here for the police
00:10:44
to solve
00:10:45
this was not a natural death although
00:10:48
that is exactly what hannah gretz had
00:10:51
implied when she called the ambulance
00:10:54
in the first phase of the investigation
00:10:57
it was not clear that christopher had
00:11:00
been murdered
00:11:02
the challenge for detectives was to
00:11:04
uncover what had happened to christopher
00:11:06
donnelly there was a number of crucial
00:11:08
findings within the home which actually
00:11:10
did point towards this being a
00:11:11
long-running systemic abuse there was
00:11:14
blood spatters found on the ceiling
00:11:16
there was blood found on the walls and
00:11:18
blood found on furniture
00:11:20
which clearly indicated this isn't just
00:11:23
somebody who's got ill and died
00:11:25
once inside the home police found
00:11:27
evidence of barbarity seasoned experts
00:11:30
were horrified by what they saw
00:11:33
the pathologist said after the
00:11:35
postmortem that he'd never seen a case
00:11:38
with so many injuries having been
00:11:40
received over such a long period of time
00:11:43
he was found to have 78 separate and
00:11:46
identifiable injuries and they were some
00:11:48
serious head injuries ear injuries his
00:11:51
voice boxer
00:11:53
cartilage had been fractured really a
00:11:57
terrible litany of awful awful injuries
00:12:00
there was evidence of a pressure point a
00:12:02
single thumb to his windpipe
00:12:06
that indicated that he had been
00:12:08
partially strangulated the sheer number
00:12:10
of injuries tell me that the violence
00:12:14
was sustained but was part of their
00:12:17
ongoing interaction it was the way in
00:12:20
which she related to her husband
00:12:22
it was becoming clear to police that
00:12:24
violence was normal within this home so
00:12:26
normal that hannah grete thought nothing
00:12:28
of admitting her assaults to the
00:12:29
authorities
00:12:31
these times that you've hit him
00:12:34
um
00:12:36
they weren't a result of him being
00:12:40
violent to you
00:12:42
no
00:12:42
or was he or being aggressive towards
00:12:45
you
00:12:46
no hannahgren then mentioned to the
00:12:48
police almost casually that she'd hit
00:12:51
christopher with a rolling pin some
00:12:53
weeks previously and it was at that
00:12:55
point that the police grew suspicious of
00:12:58
her behavior and arrested her in fact
00:13:01
the extent of his injuries was such that
00:13:04
his body just couldn't cope with it
00:13:07
officially christopher had died from
00:13:09
what can be natural causes he basically
00:13:12
died of pneumonia which meant that his
00:13:16
body was in such a physically weakened
00:13:19
position
00:13:20
that his immune system simply could not
00:13:23
fight it off
00:13:24
domestic violence can be very difficult
00:13:26
to prove but in cases of unexplained
00:13:29
deaths within the home
00:13:30
police always look to the spouse
00:13:33
detectives in the case of crown v
00:13:35
hanogrant donnelly faced a tough
00:13:37
challenge to gain a successful
00:13:38
prosecution
00:13:41
death by pneumonia is not usually
00:13:44
associated with murder
00:13:45
early on in the interview with hannah
00:13:47
grete detectives realized they needed to
00:13:49
link christopher's pneumonia to the
00:13:51
violence that he'd suffered do you feel
00:13:54
that
00:13:55
hitting him over the head with a rolling
00:13:56
pin with a hairbrush using your hands
00:13:59
and fists
00:14:00
is a
00:14:01
appropriate reaction to him
00:14:06
acting in that way
00:14:07
being in his strange moods
00:14:09
it's it's more like this
00:14:17
helping him
00:14:18
to come out of some sort of
00:14:21
peculiar trans
00:14:23
translation no i can't say it's a trance
00:14:25
but it's sort of peculiar
00:14:28
yeah feeling feeling
00:14:31
strangely
00:14:33
i don't know
00:14:35
hannah talks about
00:14:37
her husband going into a trance i think
00:14:39
that's really very likely i think it's
00:14:41
very likely that he learnt to
00:14:43
disassociate himself once the violence
00:14:45
started
00:14:47
the trance that hannah grete talks about
00:14:49
trying to knock him out of is actually
00:14:51
one that she has brought about by the
00:14:53
violence itself
00:14:55
hannah grete was candid with detectives
00:14:57
she was arguing that she had not
00:14:59
intended any harm to her husband she
00:15:02
wanted to just shake him up from what
00:15:04
she saw as laziness she was very open
00:15:06
she fully admitted that you know she
00:15:08
often should punch him she admitted
00:15:09
hitting him with
00:15:11
with a rolling pin she admitted pushing
00:15:13
him down the stairs
00:15:15
neil lancaster spent 25 years as a
00:15:18
detective in the metropolitan police
00:15:20
leading investigations into some of the
00:15:22
country's most heinous crimes what does
00:15:24
he think hannahgrad's police interview
00:15:26
reveals
00:15:28
it was um it was quite disturbing to
00:15:30
watch
00:15:31
she was incredibly calm
00:15:33
not visibly distressed
00:15:35
and almost matter-of-fact in
00:15:38
she actually described what had happened
00:15:41
at the house in almost a forensic level
00:15:43
of detail she came across as incredibly
00:15:46
cold and detached did he cower away from
00:15:49
you was he scared of you do you see what
00:15:51
i mean
00:15:52
it was more like something had a chase
00:15:55
around the kitchen table or something it
00:15:56
was more
00:15:57
yeah
00:15:58
sometimes just uh
00:16:01
yeah
00:16:02
sorry when you say it around the kitchen
00:16:04
table it's in in a more sort of
00:16:06
light-hearted we okay
00:16:08
and how did that end up with you
00:16:10
i don't know it was just feeling
00:16:15
offended that he didn't take
00:16:16
take what i said to him seriously
00:16:19
as the interview goes on detectives
00:16:21
uncovered a diary one which documented
00:16:24
the abuse after the police arrested
00:16:27
hanagaret they seized her diary and
00:16:29
among the entries in there was clear
00:16:31
evidence of abuse not least the fact
00:16:34
that hannah grete had refused to let her
00:16:36
husband go to the toilet this
00:16:38
withholding of a basic human need is
00:16:41
particularly cruel
00:16:44
it's not just controlling but it's um
00:16:46
it's dehumanizing and it's a
00:16:49
particularly shocking part of this case
00:16:52
this keeping of a diary is just another
00:16:54
facet of the control of maintaining the
00:16:57
control this documenting this it's as if
00:17:00
providing the proof of what she's had to
00:17:02
do bolsters her authority do you feel
00:17:05
that you you're justified in hitting him
00:17:07
like that
00:17:08
still
00:17:12
no there isn't justification for that
00:17:14
but it was
00:17:17
um like trying to
00:17:20
sort of reset something in him
00:17:23
hannahgret donnelly's police interviews
00:17:25
are truly chilling i don't think i've
00:17:28
ever heard a criminal talk in such a
00:17:31
dispassionate way about such a horrific
00:17:33
crime she dismisses her actions as as
00:17:37
banter and
00:17:39
as normal behavior in a relationship and
00:17:42
really shows no sign of compassion or
00:17:46
love for the man that she's killed
00:17:48
we had a chase around the kitchen table
00:17:51
in a more sort of light-hearted way okay
00:17:54
and how did that end up with you
00:17:56
i don't know it was just feeling
00:18:00
offended that she didn't take
00:18:02
take what i said to him seriously
00:18:06
hanagrat was admitting to being violent
00:18:08
but she was down playing it it was just
00:18:11
banter between husband and wife
00:18:13
to succeed in proving this was murder
00:18:15
could police prove this was not a
00:18:18
light-hearted banter to prove that she
00:18:21
intended to cause real harm to her
00:18:23
husband and by doing so considerably
00:18:26
weaken his condition
00:18:27
so leaving him prey to something like
00:18:29
pneumonia
00:18:31
what was her beef with her husband
00:18:33
christopher
00:18:34
what was her motive
00:18:36
within your family what would you say
00:18:38
your role is
00:18:40
i'd like to know what's going on so
00:18:47
to be informed as to what is going on i
00:18:49
don't like
00:18:51
like when people talk behind my back
00:18:55
bit upset when i feel that there's
00:18:58
some sort of
00:19:00
things going on that that
00:19:02
i'm not told about
00:19:04
it sounds very much as if this woman was
00:19:06
paranoid
00:19:08
she was absolutely determined to be in
00:19:11
control at all times and she didn't like
00:19:13
any secrets going on now that paranoia
00:19:16
might have meant that she felt that
00:19:17
people were scheming behind her back
00:19:19
heaven knows they had reason to try and
00:19:21
scheme and get away so it was all part
00:19:24
of this idea of keeping control this was
00:19:26
clearly a woman who was terrified of
00:19:29
losing control hannahgret had clearly
00:19:32
lost touch with any shred of common
00:19:35
decency
00:19:36
she would beat christopher if he didn't
00:19:39
answer a question quickly enough or if
00:19:42
she felt he was in some kind of trance
00:19:46
she was evil
00:19:47
she terrified him
00:19:49
and she ran that house
00:19:52
through fear
00:19:54
and intimidation
00:19:56
within the fortress hannahgrade had
00:19:58
created in the donnelly's home
00:20:00
she was in charge
00:20:01
for christopher there was no hope of
00:20:03
escape but was there hope for justice
00:20:06
barely a third of domestic abuse cases
00:20:08
attended by the police end with the
00:20:10
abuser being charged would hanagret
00:20:12
donnelly get away with murder once you
00:20:15
arrest someone you've only got initially
00:20:18
24 hours with which to deal with them
00:20:19
you've either got to charge them or
00:20:22
you've got to release them they need to
00:20:23
prove that she caused really serious
00:20:25
harm to him and she intended to cause
00:20:27
really serious harm to him
00:20:31
that would then prove murder
00:20:39
he tripped over and
00:20:41
and fell and he fell against the crate
00:20:43
there was a crate and the crate got
00:20:46
broken and then he cut himself
00:20:49
in the head
00:20:51
quite badly
00:20:53
for police in oxfordshire england a
00:20:55
question had they been called to the
00:20:57
scene of a man who had died from
00:20:59
pneumonia or had he perished because of
00:21:01
weakness caused by years of abuse at the
00:21:04
hands of his wife
00:21:05
was this developing story emerging from
00:21:07
an ordinary english home on a standard
00:21:09
housing estate one of repeated violence
00:21:11
by wife on husband
00:21:14
one of murder when police looked in more
00:21:17
detail at the donnelly's house they
00:21:20
found blood spatters in almost every
00:21:22
room they were on the window dressings
00:21:25
on furniture on the walls and all that
00:21:28
blood came from christopher donnelly
00:21:34
evidence of violence itself may not be
00:21:36
conclusive enough for a murder charge
00:21:38
but detectives felt that it was enough
00:21:40
to make a move against hannah donnelly
00:21:42
she was charged with a wounding which is
00:21:44
contrary to section 18 of the offences
00:21:46
against the persons act
00:21:48
what that essentially means is that she
00:21:50
caused a really serious injury to him
00:21:52
with intent and she meant to do it
00:21:54
investigators felt that a confession was
00:21:56
the most reliable route to a murder
00:21:58
charge and so provide justice for
00:22:01
christopher donnelly they began putting
00:22:03
all of their evidence on the table and
00:22:05
probing why mysterious things had
00:22:07
happened like when christopher allegedly
00:22:09
fell down the stairs but if you're on
00:22:11
the landing and
00:22:13
you've obviously had to reach to push
00:22:16
him
00:22:17
does that mean he's fallen down the hole
00:22:19
pretty much the whole flight of stairs
00:22:20
no no as i said he he walked a bit
00:22:24
faster than sort of pushed him on the
00:22:26
back and he walked a bit faster then and
00:22:28
then
00:22:28
he he tripped over and
00:22:31
and fell and he fell against the crate
00:22:33
there was a crate and the crate got
00:22:36
broken and then he cut himself forensic
00:22:39
criminal psychologist donna youngs
00:22:41
watched the police interview to see what
00:22:43
hanagret's body language might reveal to
00:22:45
detectives
00:22:46
what's striking here is the way in which
00:22:48
she's
00:22:50
talking about what's happened as if
00:22:52
she's talking one professional to
00:22:53
another she's just giving the technical
00:22:56
details to
00:22:57
as if she's giving a report to another
00:22:59
professional so it was a bantering kind
00:23:01
of an interaction and i then i used the
00:23:03
rolling pin that there's no emotion it's
00:23:06
a as far as she's concerned what she's
00:23:08
done is is
00:23:09
rational reasonable and she's just
00:23:11
giving a a professional account of it do
00:23:13
you feel that
00:23:15
hitting him over the head with a rolling
00:23:17
pin with a hairbrush using your hands
00:23:19
and fists
00:23:21
and this is this is incredible she's she
00:23:24
doesn't flinch when she's asked about
00:23:26
about hitting him on the head with a
00:23:27
rolling a rolling pin
00:23:29
doesn't flinch just just maintains this
00:23:32
very
00:23:33
neutral expression we get a glimpse i
00:23:36
think of
00:23:38
the way in which she conducted herself
00:23:39
within within her household this sort of
00:23:42
unquestioning authority and she's trying
00:23:44
to carry that through here to this
00:23:46
stressful situation
00:23:48
she was very open she fully admitted
00:23:50
that you know she often should punch him
00:23:51
she admitted hitting him with uh with a
00:23:53
rolling pin she admitted pushing him
00:23:55
down the stairs
00:23:57
her explanation for this was that her
00:23:59
husband would go into a trance
00:24:01
and this was her trying to snap him out
00:24:04
of a chance
00:24:06
unbelievable to see and to see her
00:24:07
speaking about this in such matter of
00:24:09
fact tones
00:24:10
and it it took me back a little bit to
00:24:13
their level of religiosity was that this
00:24:16
was almost like casting out demons it
00:24:18
seemed to be that's where she was coming
00:24:20
from these times that you've hit him
00:24:23
um
00:24:25
they weren't a result
00:24:27
of him being
00:24:29
violent to you
00:24:31
no or was he
00:24:33
being aggressive towards you as the
00:24:35
interview carries on i think we see that
00:24:37
it's actually starting to become a bit
00:24:38
of a struggle for her
00:24:40
um the word the words remain not
00:24:43
defensive
00:24:45
but the body language starts to to sit
00:24:48
in contrast to the words that are coming
00:24:50
out of her mouth so actually we start to
00:24:52
see
00:24:53
a body language that is
00:24:55
much more defensive so she starts to
00:24:57
cower the shoulders are slumping and
00:25:00
she's leaning forward she starts to look
00:25:03
like
00:25:04
your typical suspect rather than a woman
00:25:06
in charge
00:25:08
as she starts
00:25:10
talking about what happened we see her
00:25:13
use over-gesticulating
00:25:15
we see her over-gesticulating this is
00:25:17
someone who's starting whatever she's
00:25:20
saying who's starting to feel a little
00:25:22
bit uncomfortable a little bit
00:25:24
threatened
00:25:25
to donna young's hannah shows clear
00:25:28
signs of a psychological abuser and
00:25:30
declare macintosh too a former
00:25:32
policewoman
00:25:33
it's possible to divide hannahgret's
00:25:35
behavior into two different types of
00:25:38
abuse so on the one hand there was very
00:25:41
strong evidence of systemic physical
00:25:44
abuse beatings with blunt objects uh
00:25:48
punching
00:25:49
jabbing in in christopher's throat but
00:25:52
on the other hand there was
00:25:54
what would now be termed as coercive
00:25:56
control um and and legislation that's
00:25:58
come in very recently means that
00:26:00
coercive control is being taken very
00:26:02
seriously now by the justice system and
00:26:05
so that type of control was down to
00:26:09
hanagret's desire for
00:26:11
knowledge of everything that christopher
00:26:13
was doing where he was going what he was
00:26:15
thinking withholding trips to the toilet
00:26:18
withholding medical treatment complete
00:26:21
control of somebody else's life what was
00:26:23
interesting in her interview is when she
00:26:25
was asked about how she saw her role
00:26:27
within the family the way she spoke
00:26:29
about it was quite significant and she
00:26:31
said that she didn't like to feel that
00:26:33
anyone was hiding anything from her that
00:26:35
she wanted to know what was going on at
00:26:38
all times and it seemed like she was
00:26:40
incredibly controlling of her husband
00:26:43
and of her family as a whole what would
00:26:45
you say your role is
00:26:47
i don't know
00:26:52
i'd like to know what's going on
00:26:55
donnelly remained resolute throughout
00:26:57
her interview
00:26:58
she denied murder
00:27:01
a relatively slight woman a mother not
00:27:03
the typical profile of an abuser
00:27:07
but in the united kingdom more than two
00:27:08
and a half million adults experience
00:27:10
domestic violence each year
00:27:13
abusers come in all shapes and sizes
00:27:17
tragically
00:27:18
abuse in a domestic setting is all too
00:27:21
common
00:27:23
usually
00:27:24
it is a man
00:27:26
who is abusing a woman
00:27:28
who is grinding her down making her
00:27:30
believe that she is not good enough
00:27:32
making her believe that she has to be
00:27:34
reliant on him
00:27:36
and that is
00:27:37
the way in many respects that society
00:27:40
has tended to see men
00:27:42
but of course there are situations where
00:27:44
the tables are turned they are more
00:27:47
unusual not least because
00:27:49
a woman
00:27:51
is less likely to be physically more
00:27:53
powerful than a man
00:27:55
but if you take a woman who is
00:27:56
particularly big and strong or a man who
00:27:59
is particularly small and weak compared
00:28:00
to other men or both
00:28:02
or if you take a man who has deep
00:28:05
religious beliefs and does not believe
00:28:07
in fighting back believes very strongly
00:28:09
that you should never hit a woman and a
00:28:11
woman who has absolutely no compunction
00:28:14
about hitting a man
00:28:15
then it is entirely possible that you
00:28:17
set up a scenario where the woman
00:28:20
becomes the abuser
00:28:23
women abusing men is not uncommon
00:28:26
just under 800 000 men were victims of
00:28:29
domestic violence in the uk last year
00:28:31
it's dreadful
00:28:34
for a woman who was abused to feel she's
00:28:36
hopeless to feel she's helpless to feel
00:28:39
she's completely worthless
00:28:42
but as a man who comes from a very
00:28:45
traditional background where perhaps he
00:28:48
was brought up to believe that the man
00:28:50
should be the breadwinner the man of the
00:28:53
house to find himself gradually ground
00:28:57
down to the stage where he is completely
00:29:00
reliant on her and does not even feel
00:29:04
able to escape the abuse
00:29:07
the impact on his self-esteem
00:29:09
on his morale on his mental well-being
00:29:13
must have been devastating
00:29:19
alex skeel was trapped in a long-term
00:29:21
abusive relationship he was only saved
00:29:24
when police intervened and his wife and
00:29:26
mother of his two children was jailed
00:29:29
she
00:29:31
would say oh i deserved it and say
00:29:33
things like that which is really common
00:29:35
and it would be the same for christopher
00:29:37
it would be the same for thousands of
00:29:38
men that are going through this probably
00:29:40
now as i speak
00:29:42
they just always say well you deserve it
00:29:44
it's your fault it always puts the blame
00:29:46
onto them she doesn't see her victim as
00:29:49
fully human so that actually they're not
00:29:52
that relevant to her as an individual in
00:29:55
any kind of emotional sense there's
00:29:56
always the same cycle with these things
00:29:59
the first incident occurs
00:30:01
they say sorry then it happens again and
00:30:03
they sort of fantasize about it and then
00:30:06
it happens and then the cycle begins and
00:30:09
it's until someone externally breaks
00:30:12
that cycle
00:30:14
nothing's going to change it'll just
00:30:15
keep going and going and going and
00:30:17
that's what happened with me and it
00:30:19
most likely was the same for christopher
00:30:20
as well
00:30:23
like the vast majority of cases of
00:30:25
domestic violence the abuse meted out
00:30:27
onto christopher over years took place
00:30:29
behind closed doors without any
00:30:32
independent witnesses it's just so
00:30:34
lonely and dark and
00:30:36
you don't have anyone to talk to
00:30:39
i could imagine there was probably no
00:30:40
conversations that went on between them
00:30:42
other than arguments
00:30:45
it's the way it is and it's just
00:30:47
a really horrible way to live
00:30:51
and it was the daily existence of
00:30:53
christopher donnelly
00:30:55
i know how he was feeling at that time i
00:30:58
knew that my body was shutting down and
00:31:00
i was waiting to die i just thought well
00:31:03
the next time i get
00:31:05
stabbed the next time i get hit it's
00:31:07
going to be in the wrong place or the
00:31:09
knife is going to go a little bit deeper
00:31:10
or going the wrong way
00:31:12
and
00:31:14
eventually i just my body will shut down
00:31:19
wife on husband abuse may appear to get
00:31:21
little publicity but oxford detectives
00:31:24
felt they had a chilling example of it
00:31:26
on their hands
00:31:27
in march 2019 would they secure a murder
00:31:30
conviction against hannahgret donnelly
00:31:33
her defense in court i
00:31:35
think was quite clearly that the assault
00:31:37
she carried out which he fully admitted
00:31:39
carrying out were not the resultant
00:31:41
cause of his death
00:31:42
[Music]
00:31:44
and that he died of an illness
00:31:52
police had hannah grete donnelly in
00:31:54
custody but prosecutions for murder are
00:31:56
seldom straightforward
00:31:58
investigators needed to prove that there
00:32:00
was a direct link from the pneumonia
00:32:02
that had killed christopher and the
00:32:04
violence that he had suffered at the
00:32:05
hands of his wife and what lawyers call
00:32:08
men's reya in layman's terms that she
00:32:11
had meant to hurt her husband that the
00:32:13
former midwife
00:32:14
mother of his four children had known
00:32:16
what she was doing over the years of
00:32:18
apparent systemic abuse
00:32:20
an interview in a murder case such as
00:32:22
this will be there'll be a formal
00:32:24
strategy which will be agreed with the
00:32:26
senior investigating officer
00:32:28
and the strategy would have been these
00:32:31
are
00:32:32
what we need to work we need to find out
00:32:33
what's going on we need to get her
00:32:35
talking that didn't seem to be a problem
00:32:37
she seemed eager to talk to prove murder
00:32:39
they need to prove that she caused
00:32:41
really serious harm to him and she
00:32:43
intended to cause really serious harm to
00:32:45
him
00:32:46
other evidence available to the
00:32:47
prosecution was the initial reason they
00:32:49
had suspected hannahgret of murder the
00:32:52
delay in the time that she had taken to
00:32:54
call the police after she claimed she
00:32:56
had found her husband inexplicably dead
00:33:00
leaving somebody that at some point you
00:33:02
have presumably loved regardless of
00:33:05
what's happened in your relationship
00:33:07
to die on their own on a bathroom floor
00:33:11
and not to call the authorities until
00:33:13
some 12 hours after life is extinct
00:33:17
indicates a lack of any moral fiber a
00:33:22
lack of any compassion it is not a
00:33:25
normal response to somebody's death and
00:33:28
it's one of the most chilling things
00:33:30
about this woman
00:33:33
a jury would hear her maintain that any
00:33:35
violence to christopher had been for his
00:33:37
own sake
00:33:38
it's it's more like this
00:33:45
helping him
00:33:47
to come out of some sort of
00:33:50
peculiar trans
00:33:52
translation no i can't say it's a trance
00:33:54
but it's sort of peculiar
00:33:56
i have read some reports
00:33:58
where hannahgre suggested that
00:34:01
christopher almost invited these
00:34:03
beatings
00:34:04
well i struggle to think of anybody
00:34:07
who would like a whack over the head
00:34:09
with a rolling pin
00:34:11
i also struggle to think that a
00:34:13
relationship that plumbed the depths
00:34:16
that this did
00:34:18
was ever a relationship built on
00:34:21
equality
00:34:23
it was according to hanagret the
00:34:25
victim's fault a suggestion faced by
00:34:27
another man who'd suffered at the hands
00:34:29
of his wife
00:34:31
i don't know if they just get into like
00:34:33
some
00:34:34
fantasy i don't really know but
00:34:37
for them to keep doing that they've got
00:34:39
to kind of
00:34:40
take out their head what they're
00:34:41
actually doing is wrong and they've got
00:34:43
to try and somehow
00:34:44
reason for what they're doing
00:34:47
the case put to a jury centered on the
00:34:49
causes of the pneumonia which led to the
00:34:51
death of christopher donnelly broncon
00:34:53
pneumonia can cause a wide variety of
00:34:55
symptoms but of course it can have an
00:34:57
impact on your mental state because if
00:35:00
you're lacking oxygen to the brain and
00:35:02
if you have germs flooding around your
00:35:05
body you can feel light-headed
00:35:07
you can feel dizzy you can feel confused
00:35:10
and it's entirely possible that your
00:35:12
level of consciousness would drop so
00:35:14
that you would enter
00:35:16
what his wife described as a quote
00:35:19
trance-like state
00:35:22
no
00:35:23
normal wife would dream
00:35:25
of dealing with that
00:35:27
by hitting him with the rolling pin to
00:35:29
knock it out of him
00:35:30
but would the jury accept that his
00:35:32
susceptibility to pneumonia was caused
00:35:34
by his physical condition
00:35:36
he had a cauliflower ear she had at some
00:35:39
point either hit him across the throat
00:35:41
or perhaps tried to strangle him because
00:35:43
he had damage there to his voice box
00:35:46
there's no question that by the end this
00:35:49
was a totally callous woman who
00:35:53
systematically over months and years
00:35:57
physically really dreadfully physically
00:36:00
abused her husband until as the police
00:36:03
said he was so weakened that he
00:36:05
effectively succumbed to his injuries
00:36:08
from a complication
00:36:10
although christopher was only 55 when he
00:36:12
died a neighbor described him in court
00:36:15
as looking more like an 80 year old man
00:36:17
so it's clear that the effect of
00:36:19
hannahgratt's behavior was having a
00:36:22
profound impact on him
00:36:24
it's it's almost as though the weaker he
00:36:27
got the stronger hannahgret got as
00:36:29
though she was almost feeding on his
00:36:32
weakness and by the time he died there
00:36:34
was no doubt about it she had complete
00:36:36
control over that family
00:36:39
particularly her husband found dead at
00:36:41
the foot of the stairs in their family
00:36:43
home she said because he had tripped
00:36:46
if you're on the landing and
00:36:49
you've obviously had to reach
00:36:51
to push him
00:36:52
does that mean he's fallen down the hole
00:36:54
pretty much the whole flight of stairs
00:36:55
no no as i said he he walked a bit
00:36:59
faster then sort of pushed him on the
00:37:01
back and he walked a bit faster than and
00:37:03
then he he tripped over and
00:37:07
and fell and she fell against the crate
00:37:09
there was a crate and
00:37:10
the crate got broken and then he cut
00:37:12
himself
00:37:14
in the head
00:37:16
after years of building up that control
00:37:18
of creating a fortress in which he was
00:37:20
queen would it be hannahgret's own words
00:37:23
that would eventually damn her
00:37:25
the jury were offered a complete picture
00:37:27
of hannah grete donnelly
00:37:29
anna gret had clearly lost touch with
00:37:31
any shred of common decency
00:37:34
she would beat christopher
00:37:36
if he didn't answer a question quickly
00:37:39
enough she terrified him
00:37:41
and she ran that house
00:37:44
through fear
00:37:45
and
00:37:48
intimidation this is a woman who clearly
00:37:51
had absolutely no concept of right and
00:37:53
wrong this is a woman who clearly
00:37:55
believed that it was perfectly
00:37:57
acceptable for her to beat her husband
00:37:59
regularly and systematically she beat
00:38:02
him to control him
00:38:03
she beat him to stop being irritating
00:38:05
when the being irritating actually was
00:38:08
him dying in front of her that is the
00:38:10
sort of woman she was
00:38:13
the trial of hannah grete donnelly took
00:38:15
13 days after weighing up the evidence
00:38:17
the jury reached the verdict hannah
00:38:19
grete donnelly was guilty of the murder
00:38:22
of her husband
00:38:24
she was found unanimously guilty by the
00:38:27
jury on the 20th of march 2019 and
00:38:30
sentenced a life imprisonment with a
00:38:31
minimum term of 16 years
00:38:37
they didn't take very long to decide at
00:38:39
all in this case which must have been
00:38:42
truly shocking to have heard
00:38:45
not least for the family who had to hear
00:38:47
all the evidence of abuse that she'd
00:38:50
given to christopher over the years
00:38:53
the judge did say that there was clearly
00:38:55
evidence of happier times but he was
00:38:58
appalled by the behaviour by her
00:39:01
controlling behavior and by the severity
00:39:04
and the longevity of the abuse that she
00:39:07
had committed i would categorize
00:39:09
hernigrette as a victim as object
00:39:12
murderer these murderers see see their
00:39:15
victims not as fully human but as
00:39:17
objects objects upon whom they can enact
00:39:20
it can carry out any form of violent
00:39:23
control and power
00:39:26
the judge spoke of the horror at what
00:39:28
she'd heard throughout the trial it was
00:39:30
clear she said that christopher
00:39:31
experienced real physical suffering for
00:39:33
a long period before his death it was
00:39:36
inconceivable that he didn't also suffer
00:39:38
mentally
00:39:39
hannahgret donnelly was pathologically
00:39:43
controlling and that desire for control
00:39:46
resulted in the most horrific abuse i've
00:39:49
ever heard of
00:39:50
did he cower away from you was he scared
00:39:53
of you it might be
00:39:54
easy to assume that the the most
00:39:57
shocking element of this case is that
00:39:59
the offender is a woman we're perhaps
00:40:01
very used to domestic violence being
00:40:04
committed by men but
00:40:07
men are victims of domestic violence far
00:40:09
too often
00:40:10
and what this case shows is that this is
00:40:13
a very real problem that that needs to
00:40:15
be addressed regardless of the the
00:40:17
genders of the people involved
00:40:19
what shocked me the most was
00:40:21
just how vulnerable christopher was and
00:40:24
the fact that nobody noticed that here
00:40:27
was a family with children who were
00:40:29
living on a very ordinary estate in a
00:40:32
very ordinary town and yet
00:40:35
somehow they went under the radar and
00:40:37
that's a truly shocking
00:40:39
thing in today's society
00:40:42
why did christopher donnelly not fight
00:40:44
back
00:40:46
we have to bear in mind that
00:40:48
even though we are moving on in this
00:40:50
direction we still live in a society
00:40:53
where it's more difficult for a man to
00:40:54
come forward and say that he is being
00:40:56
abused in the home
00:40:58
halagreat and christopher could have had
00:41:00
the perfect life together the perfect
00:41:01
marriage the perfect family
00:41:03
instead for years away from prying eyes
00:41:06
hannahgret donnelly waged a war against
00:41:08
her husband
00:41:10
a war he could not survive
00:41:14
[Music]
00:41:17
i've met lots of criminals over the
00:41:19
course of my police career and i've
00:41:22
researched even more as a result of my
00:41:25
crime writing years
00:41:27
i don't think i've ever come across such
00:41:29
a terrifying figure as hannah donnelly
00:41:33
the lack of compassion and the extent of
00:41:35
her of her abuse is is truly horrific
00:41:39
and arguably if i wrote a character that
00:41:41
bad i'm not sure anyone would believe
00:41:44
that she could exist
00:41:48
[Music]
00:42:41
you
