The mother of a "violent" woman charged with stabbing her husband to death predicted her daughter would one day kill someone, a court was told yesterday.
Sandra Clinch, 49, is charged with murdering her fourth husband Alan, 48, by stabbing him through the heart with a pair of dress-making scissors.
The mother-of-five, who denies murder, claims she threw the scissors at Mr Clinch during a row over housework and accidentally killed him at their home in Darite, Liskeard, in May.
Jurors at Truro Crown Court have already heard Clinch had a violent temper and would attack her children and former husbands when in a rage.
Yesterday, consultant psychiatrist Dr John Sandford gave evidence for the defence and revealed details of a meeting between Clinch's mother and an educational welfare officer in 1978, when the defendant was around 13 years old.
Dr Sandford said: "Her mother said she was having difficulty managing (Clinch's) violent temper. She said 'Sandra will end up murdering someone some day'." He said Clinch's GP prescribed her Valium when she was 13 years old, by 14 she was in care, and by 15 she was pregnant.
Dr Sandford said in 1988 Clinch, then a mother herself, told a health visitor she had tried to strangle her son and punched him in the face, knocking one of his teeth out.
He went on to tell the court he believed the defendant had a personality disorder, which is a clinical diagnosis for which there is no test.
Dr Sandford said those with the diagnosis were "a group of people who have a personality type of extreme range". He said: "They have an abnormal and difficult personality, causing them significant distress and other people around them significant distress."
Mr Clinch was pronounced dead in hospital after he received the fatal wound at the couple's cottage in Darite, on May 13. A post-mortem examination revealed the scissors had been plunged between 3in and 4in into Mr Clinch's chest, entering between two ribs.
Clinch immediately dialled 999 and while paramedics were on their way, carried out chest compressions on her husband under instructions from the emergency operator.
The trial continues.
