Barclays UK exec 'snapped,' killed wife with crowbar during fight: Authorities
A British bank executive allegedly battered his sick wife to death with a crowbar when she called him “useless” and their daughter a “fat slag,” according to reports.
David Pomphret, a 51-year-old associate vice president at Barclays UK, allegedly “snapped” on Nov. 2, 2018, killing his wife, Ann Marie, after she began to “rant and rave,” his lawyer said Monday, according to the Manchester Evening News. She had been undergoing cancer treatment and was suffering from mental health issues, according to the outlet.
An autopsy determined Ann Marie had been hit in the head more than 30 times and had injuries consistent with those caused by a crowbar, which was found in a pond not far from the scene.
Pomphret was charged on April 3 for the homicide, Cheshire Police said. He later copped to the manslaughter of his wife, but rejected the notion that he murdered her.
Defense attorney Richard Pratt told the jury Monday during the trial for Ann Marie’s murder that the couple had been arguing, with the woman calling her husband “useless.”
Ann Marie then allegedly “turned her attention” to their 18-year-old daughter Megan, calling her a “fat slag” – “slag” being a term for an overly sexually active woman – and claiming she was “out to get sex.”
"This is a case where a quiet man finally snapped,” Pratt told the court. "You may have little doubt in concluding this was a man who had completely lost his normal character and self-control."
But prosecutor Gordon Cole painted a much different picture, explaining how Pomphret had fed police a “complete pack of lies” in the immediate aftermath of Ann Marie’s death.
At 9:47 that night, he called authorities and claimed he merely found his wife’s lifeless body in the stables near their Cheshire home.
"My wife came to the stables a couple of hours ago and I’ve have not been able to get her on the phone so I have just come down to the stables and she is lying on the floor in a pool of blood,” he allegedly told the operator, describing her as being “white as a sheet.”
When the police operator suggested he perform CPR, Pomphret allegedly asked: “Are you joking?”
He later asked the operator questions, such as “who would have done this?” and “who has done this to me wife?”
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Pomphret also sent several text messages to his wife, asking where she was and expressing concern.
A spokesperson for Barclays UK did not immediately respond to FOX Business' request for comment.
He is due back in court on Tuesday.