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00:11I'm David Wilson, Emeritus Professor of Criminology, and for over 30 years, I've investigated the phenomenon of murder, and what
00:21it is that might motivate someone to kill.
00:27Every murder case is different, but time and again, a deadly pattern emerges of warning signs and red flags.
00:39In this new series, I investigate some of the UK's most harrowing murder cases to understand how and why these
00:50terrible crimes occur.
00:54This is Murder UK.
01:16On a sunny March day, 55-year-old music teacher Christopher Donnelly was reported dead at home.
01:25Though his wife, Hannah Gritt, suggested the death was natural, police were instantly suspicious.
01:33They knew this was no ordinary death, and their initial inquiry focused entirely on proving that a murder had taken
01:42place.
01:44Detectives began questioning Hannah Gritt Donnelly.
01:50Within your family, what would you say your role is?
02:01Yeah, I don't know.
02:07I'd like to know what's going on.
02:10I'd like to be informed as to what is going on.
02:17I don't like it when people talk behind my back.
02:21Over the coming weeks, evidence would emerge suggesting something sinister happened behind the closed doors of an ordinary home on
02:31an ordinary street.
02:32The first that the emergency services knew about Christopher's death was when they received a call from Hannah Gritt using
02:40her neighbour's phone to say that her husband had died the night before.
02:44When they attended, they found Christopher clearly dead on the bathroom floor with a significant number of injuries.
02:55Hannah Gritt called the emergency services from her neighbour's phone because the Donnelly family, Hannah Gritt and Christopher, and their
03:04four children, had opted out of society, choosing not to own a phone.
03:13She told the operator Christopher had died the night before, claiming she'd tried to revive him.
03:21Emergency services immediately noted the unusual delay.
03:26The patient had reportedly died hours earlier.
03:35The 999 operator questioned a little bit, saying, when did he die?
03:40And she told him it was 12 hours ago, and that she hadn't called in the interim because they were
03:45coming to terms with his death.
03:48Police and ambulance turned up at the same time.
03:53Hannegritt's decision to wait 12 hours before calling for help, and also using a neighbour's phone to do so, isn't
04:02a sign of panic, but a deliberate, calculated act.
04:09That delay of 12 hours allows her to decide what her story's going to be, clean up the crime scene,
04:18calm down.
04:19So, from the very start, Hannegritt is deliberately staging a narrative that she would like the outside world to accept
04:29about what happens to her husband.
04:34Wounds over his head and face looked several days old.
04:39They'd already scabbed over.
04:42A paramedic also noted a significant admission.
04:47Hannegritt stated they'd had a falling out, and when that happened, she'd hit Christopher with a rolling pin.
04:56Damning evidence begins to emerge.
05:00She admitted that she had assaulted him at some point in the past, but he had just simply died.
05:07All in all, a series of highly abnormal events seem to have taken place.
05:16Leaving somebody that, at some point, you have presumably loved, regardless of what's happened in your relationship,
05:23to die on their own on a bathroom floor and not to call the authorities until some 12 hours after
05:32life is extinct indicates a lack of any moral fibre,
05:38a lack of any compassion.
05:40It is not a normal response to somebody's death, and it's one of the most chilling things about this woman.
05:48Police bring the German-born Hannegritt in for further questioning.
05:53She had admitted to assaulting Christopher in the past, and was that what happened here?
06:00He tripped over and fell, and she fell against the crate.
06:05There was a crate, and the crate got broken, and then he cut himself on the head.
06:12Her answers were convoluted.
06:16Police quickly suspected this was far from an accident.
06:20The wounds to Christopher's head were clearly not caused by falling on a crate.
06:26When Christopher Donnelly's body was examined, 78 external injuries were found,
06:33and internal injuries, which included a fractured spine and a fractured neck.
06:41Even a cursory examination of the body would have clearly revealed evidence of domestic abuse.
06:49There was a number of crucial findings within the home which actually did point towards this being a long-running
06:55systemic abuse.
06:57There was blood spatters found on the ceiling, there was blood found on the walls, and blood found on furniture,
07:02which clearly indicated this isn't just somebody who's got ill and died.
07:07This is someone who's been violently assaulted on a number of occasions.
07:13It's the forensic discovery of blood spatter on the ceilings and on the wall
07:21that really give us evidence that what happens to Christopher isn't a singular abusive attack,
07:29but characterised by systematic abuse over many months, many years.
07:37And, of course, what we tend to forget is that whether you're a man or a woman,
07:42you're more likely to be murdered in a domestic setting than in an outdoor public space.
07:50The home for Christopher was not a place of sanctuary.
07:54It's the forensic evidence in particular that refutes Hanegret's narrative
08:01that this was an accident, that Christopher had simply fallen onto the crate.
08:08Christopher's official cause of death was listed as bronchal pneumonia,
08:13but police had to determine if the death was accelerated by his wife's violence.
08:20Was this a murder case?
08:22When questioned, Hanegret Donnelly offered a bizarre justification.
08:27Her husband had entered a trance and she had hit him with a rolling pin
08:33simply to force him to snap out of it.
08:38I did hit him a bit harder sometimes, but as I said, he never...
08:46It wasn't that he sort of fell over and lost consciousness.
08:52Hanegret claimed that frequently the abuse was due to some desire
08:57to bring him out of what she called a trance,
09:00that he would be in a state where he wasn't listening
09:03and she would want to revive him from that.
09:06But what we know is that Christopher was a very, very ill man by this point.
09:11He was both physically and mentally weak.
09:16One of the strangest features of this case
09:21is the weaponisation of Christopher's health.
09:27Hanegret actually claims that she was beating Christopher
09:32so as to sort of waken him out of his trance-like state.
09:37Whereas in fact, his trance-like state is caused by the fact
09:42he has been beaten regularly by his wife.
09:48The belief that somehow she can talk her way out
09:52of what has happened to Christopher.
09:55She thinks because she controlled that domestic sphere
09:58in the way that she did,
10:00that she can control all the spheres outside the home
10:04in relation to explaining what might have happened to her husband.
10:09The police interview tapes offer a crucial window
10:13into the true nature of Hanegret Donnelly.
10:17What I see here is somebody whose body language
10:19is very much at odds with the words coming out of her mouth.
10:22She's used to providing a believable, rational, reasonable,
10:27almost professional account of what happened.
10:31What was the real cause of Christopher Donnelly's death?
10:38Bronchopneumonia or years of beatings at the hands of his wife?
10:52The violence inflicted upon Christopher Donnelly
10:55was dismissed by his wife Hanegret
10:58as nothing more than banter between husband and wife.
11:03It was more like we had a chase around the kitchen table or something.
11:08It was more, you know, sometimes just, yeah...
11:13Sorry, I wouldn't say chase around the kitchen table.
11:16..in a more sort of light-hearted way.
11:19Her story is simply not adding up.
11:23To charge Hanegret with murder,
11:26detectives had to uncover the truth
11:28hidden inside an ordinary home on the Buryfields estate.
11:37The couple had been married for 23 years.
11:42Christopher, a music teacher with a biochemistry degree,
11:46was a talented musician.
11:49Their life, a husband, wife and four children,
11:53was a routine dictated by the strong,
11:57matriarchal influence of Hanegret Donnelly.
12:02Hanegret Donnelly, in some respects, is a bit of a mystery.
12:05She and her family very much kept themselves to themselves.
12:08She'd trained as a midwife,
12:09but in fact hadn't worked since she'd had her children.
12:12She'd been a stay-at-home mum and homeschooling them.
12:15Her husband, Christopher, had a science background,
12:18but he was a very talented musician.
12:20He'd worked as a music teacher for a long time and performed as well.
12:24He was around the same age, a year older than his wife.
12:28They'd been married for 23 years.
12:32So far, the Donnelly story seems normal.
12:35But aspects of the household are starkly dissimilar from the lives of their neighbours.
12:43They were incredibly a religious family with deeply held beliefs.
12:47They apparently had some type of view around there being an end-of-day's existence.
12:55What emerges is that the Donnelly family, Hanegret, Christopher, and their four children,
13:02had opted out of society, with Hanegret at the heart of every decision.
13:09Hanegret had gradually begun to take more control of things in their relationship.
13:17She had little interest in the world beyond the confines of their four walls.
13:23Such was their mistrust that they took their children out of mainstream education
13:26and schooled them at home.
13:28All the reports are that they lived a very insular existence
13:32and really didn't associate with neighbours or anything particularly such as that.
13:39I get the sense that Hanegret creates, within the home, a kind of psychological fortress.
13:48The home becomes her domain.
13:51The children are homeschooled.
13:54She cuts off technology to the house.
13:58She controls the influences within the house itself.
14:03And therefore, there's no contradictory voices.
14:07Was this isolation part of a bigger picture?
14:13Experts agree that isolation is a tried and trusted technique
14:18that's utilised by abusers to gain greater power over vulnerable victims.
14:26It is possible, of course, for families to be very happy and self-sufficient,
14:30to homeschool their own children,
14:32to avoid the evils of the internet and modern technology.
14:36But it also makes it much, much more difficult for any authorities
14:42to keep an eye on what's going on
14:44and to raise concerns if they see anything out of the ordinary.
14:50Christopher's life took a turn after his marriage.
14:54Though it started well,
14:56police uncover that he had become both physically weak
14:59and mentally frail in recent years.
15:04Her husband initially was a talented musician,
15:08but quite clearly over time became more and more and more weak
15:12and became a shadow of his former self.
15:14By January 2018,
15:19Christopher was effectively disabled and unable to walk.
15:23His health simply dwindled over the years of his marriage,
15:28likely due to the injuries he suffered at his wife's hands.
15:35We know that Christopher stopped working as a music teacher in 2015 due to ill health,
15:41and we can only assume that some of that ill health
15:44was as a result of Hanegret's treatment of him.
15:47His mental health began to suffer,
15:50and what's particularly distressing about this case
15:52is the knowledge that Hanegret was abusing her husband
15:56at the very time when he needed her support.
15:59So, gradually, Christopher became weaker,
16:02not just physically, but mentally,
16:04until he wasn't able to defend himself at all.
16:08Detectives needed to know more from this outwardly cooperative woman,
16:13who, to many, seemed like an unlikely abuser.
16:20The pathologist said he had never seen a case
16:23where so many injuries were inflicted.
16:29That kind of says it all
16:31for Christopher, a 55-year-old man,
16:35to have been subjected to such abuse,
16:38which led to so much scar tissue,
16:40that even a home office pathologist was shocked.
16:46There were a number of old injuries as well
16:49that showed that Christopher's abuse had started many years previously.
16:54He had a cauliflower ear,
16:56which is more commonly associated with rugby player injuries,
17:00and a fracture to the cartilage in his voice box,
17:04which was consistent with attempted strangulation.
17:07These are not minor injuries.
17:10This is not a bitter peak.
17:11This is systematic physical abuse,
17:15using third-party objects,
17:18not just using her fists.
17:20The critical question for detectives was simple.
17:25Can a death from pneumonia be directly linked
17:28to years of sustained beating?
17:32There are different types of pneumonia,
17:34and some of them strike much more quickly than others.
17:37Some of them are very, very virulent.
17:39Some of them can strike completely healthy people
17:42and leave them almost at death's door within hours.
17:47But others are only likely to strike
17:50if somebody's physical condition has been so weakened
17:54that that germ can invade more deeply.
17:58It seems highly likely
18:00that Christopher was in such a physically weakened state
18:04that even his immune system was giving up.
18:10The pathologist's conclusion
18:12was that Christopher didn't die from natural causes.
18:16He didn't die from bronchial pneumonia.
18:19Instead, he died because of the 78 injuries
18:23that the pathologist was able to determine.
18:27And therefore, in the eyes of the law,
18:29that's where we can bring a murder charge.
18:32The abuse of men by women
18:35is more common than many people think.
18:39Alex Skeel, who was trapped
18:41in a long-term abusive relationship
18:43until his former partner was jailed,
18:46considers the parallels
18:48with what happened to Christopher Donnelly.
18:52You can't do anything right.
18:57And I always think of it as
18:59if you offer to do the cooking,
19:02you're the worst cook in the world.
19:04Then if you don't offer to do the cooking,
19:06it's, oh, well, you never cook.
19:07So you never, ever, right, you're always wrong.
19:10And there's so many examples
19:11that you're always walking on eggshells, as they say,
19:13and you're just so frightened of doing anything wrong.
19:16And then it gets to the point
19:17where you almost try and avoid any triggers
19:23that you know that will trigger her off.
19:26You turn into just a robot,
19:27and that's, you're just,
19:30that's just your way of life,
19:32and you can't get out of it.
19:36In the vast majority of domestic abuse cases,
19:40men are the perpetrators.
19:43But as detectives consider a murder charge,
19:46it's clear Hanna-Gritt Donnelly's case
19:49is far from usual.
19:51It's possible to divide Hanna-Gritt's behaviour
19:54into two different types of abuse.
19:57So on the one hand,
19:59there was very strong evidence
20:01of systemic physical abuse,
20:04beatings with blunt objects,
20:06punching, jabbing in Christopher's throat.
20:09I suffered abuse for five years.
20:13It started off with really small little things
20:16that happened,
20:17and it was simple things like,
20:19oh, you can't wear those shoes.
20:21I prefer these shoes.
20:22Oh, you can't have your hair like that.
20:23I don't like the top you're wearing.
20:25I don't like the colour.
20:26So that type of control
20:27was down to Hanna-Gritt's desire
20:30for knowledge of everything
20:32that Christopher was doing,
20:34where he was going,
20:35what he was thinking,
20:36withholding trips to the toilet,
20:38withholding medical treatment,
20:40complete control of somebody else's life.
20:44What's unusual here is that that abuse
20:46does not seem to be motivated,
20:47as we might expect,
20:49by any kind of anger or hatred of her victim,
20:53but rather by an unquestioning belief
20:56in her own absolute authority.
20:59This very much speaks to a woman
21:01who is a complete bully,
21:05who is an abuser,
21:07and relatively unusually,
21:09a physical abuser of a man,
21:12but also a woman who has no remorse
21:15and who believes that her enjoyment of life,
21:20her satisfaction,
21:21and that avoiding any irritations of her life
21:24are more important than anything else.
21:27It may even be that she got perverse pleasure
21:31out of tormenting her eventually
21:35completely powerless husband.
21:37Nine out of ten murder perpetrators are men,
21:43but that does mean there is a small group of women
21:46who are prepared to use lethal violence,
21:49and Hanegret is one of those people.
21:52She was enjoying the control,
21:55the total control that she exercised over Christopher,
21:59the way that she created this isolated environment
22:03in which she could do as she pleased.
22:07It's now believed that Christopher suffered
22:10over a decade of abuse.
22:13Throughout that entire time,
22:15his physical condition meant
22:17he was rendered effectively defenceless.
22:21So with every subsequent act of violence
22:24that she inflicted upon her husband,
22:26he was weakened,
22:27and therefore the next act of violence
22:29became even more impactful,
22:30was even more powerful,
22:32had an even more powerful effect.
22:34and she reduced him over time
22:37almost to the state of a wounded animal.
22:40It was more like,
22:41I think we had a chase around the kitchen table or something.
22:44It was more, you know,
22:46sometimes just, yeah...
22:49Sorry, what did you say?
22:51A chase around the kitchen table
22:52in a more sort of light-hearted way.
22:54The picture detectives are forming
22:57is a living hell
22:59for a man hidden in plain sight.
23:03Christopher, beaten, scolded, trapped.
23:07Alex Skeel understands that feeling.
23:11Yeah, you just don't want to leave
23:12because you fear that possibly something could happen to the children.
23:16She even threatened to kill me if I tried to leave.
23:19But you're just stuck.
23:21The police were now uncovering
23:23the truly horrific reality
23:25of life inside the Donnelly family home.
23:37Four children were part of the Donnelly family,
23:41yet not one of them complained
23:43about their mother's treatment of their father.
23:46Given the circumstances,
23:48it's highly unlikely
23:50that they would have been able to.
23:54It doesn't surprise me
23:56that none of the children
23:57came forward to the authorities.
23:59It's clear that Hannah Gret
24:01ruled that family with a rod of iron
24:03and no doubt anyone in that family,
24:06children as well as Christopher,
24:08were absolutely terrified of her.
24:11Because the family had no visitors
24:13and saw few people,
24:14Christopher had no sense of hope.
24:18His children were isolated
24:20from anyone who might help too.
24:23What shocked me the most
24:25was just how vulnerable Christopher was
24:28and the fact that nobody noticed
24:30that here was a family with children
24:33who were living on a very ordinary estate
24:35in a very ordinary town,
24:38and yet somehow they went under the radar.
24:42The key to Hannah Gret's long-term abuse
24:47of Christopher was, in fact,
24:50ensuring their children's silence.
24:53You know, the children weren't able
24:56to talk about what it was that they saw,
25:00the fact that their mother was abusing their father.
25:03The children's silence becomes also a means
25:07by which we have to recognise
25:09that this was a very psychologically controlling
25:12domestic environment.
25:15And in that respect,
25:16the children are also victims.
25:19This systematic, psychological, controlled environment
25:25creates almost a vacuum
25:28in which it's possible
25:30to physically abuse Christopher
25:34for year after year after year.
25:39Hannah Gret Donnelly's power over Christopher
25:41was unquestionable.
25:43The abuse was so frequent
25:45it became the norm.
25:47The relationship dynamic
25:49had shifted so completely
25:51that Christopher was unable to function
25:53without his wife's say-so.
25:56What is clear here
25:57is that the level of control
26:00and the level of abuse
26:03made this an almost everyday occurrence,
26:07a level of abuse
26:08that had simply become accepted.
26:10It's just so lonely and dark
26:13and you don't have anyone to talk to.
26:16I can imagine there was probably
26:17no conversations that went on between them
26:19other than arguments.
26:21It's the way it is
26:22and it's just a really horrible way to live.
26:26I have read some reports
26:27where Hannah Gret suggested
26:30that Christopher almost invited these beatings.
26:38Well, I struggle to think
26:39that a relationship
26:41that plumbed the depths
26:43that this did
26:44was ever a relationship
26:47that was ever built on equality.
26:51To me, it feels like
26:52somebody who was almost brainwashed as a child,
26:55somebody who's come out
26:56of some really kind of bizarre childhood upbringing
26:59that has taught her to think in this way
27:02about human relationships
27:04and about the need to maintain control.
27:07That's what I would suspect with Hannah Gret.
27:10What we do know
27:12is that her power over Christopher was absolute.
27:17After the police arrested Hannah Gret,
27:19they seized her diary
27:20and among the entries in there
27:22was clear evidence of abuse,
27:24not least the fact that Hannah Gret
27:26had refused to let her husband go to the toilet.
27:29And this withholding of a basic human need
27:33is particularly cruel.
27:35It's not just controlling,
27:36but it's dehumanising
27:38and it's a particularly shocking part of this case.
27:43It now seems likely
27:44that Christopher Donnelly,
27:46suffering from years of abuse,
27:49actually thought he was the one in the wrong.
27:52Blaming it upon yourself
27:55when you are a victim is quite common.
27:57Most people that I've spoken to,
27:59that's male, female,
28:01whatever, gender, age, ethnicity.
28:04I've had thousands of people message me.
28:07They've all said the same thing.
28:08I thought it was my fault
28:09when in fact it isn't at all.
28:11They just made to believe that.
28:13And that's why it kind of makes it worse
28:15because I think for a lot of people,
28:19you try and sort of
28:22pleased them more
28:23so they make out that it isn't your fault.
28:25Because you just completely feel
28:27that it's your fault
28:27and you're doing something wrong
28:28so you try and change it
28:30but then it goes back to what I was saying
28:31about cooking the food
28:32and not cooking the food.
28:33It just goes back to that.
28:34It's a vicious circle
28:35and it just goes round and round and round.
28:38And I think,
28:39yeah,
28:40you do feel as though
28:42it's your own fault
28:43but then part of you
28:44knows that it isn't.
28:45The problem facing detectives
28:48having amassed evidence
28:50of abuse and control
28:51is proving the murder.
28:54If Hannah Gritt is a killer,
28:56how can they get her to confess?
28:59To be honest,
29:01Hannah Gritt is perfectly composed
29:03during her police interviews.
29:06She's calm.
29:07She doesn't feel under pressure.
29:10She's simply selling her narrative
29:12and that's because
29:14she's lived within an environment
29:16in which her narrative,
29:18her word was law.
29:20Why wouldn't it be law
29:21in this environment too?
29:24An interview in a murder case
29:25such as this will be,
29:27there'll be a formal strategy
29:28which will be agreed
29:29with the senior investigating officer.
29:31First of all,
29:32I try to sort things out with him
29:35in sort of a
29:38bantering sort of way.
29:40The strategy would have been,
29:41we need to find out what's going on,
29:43we need to get her talking.
29:44That didn't seem to be a problem.
29:45She seemed eager to talk
29:47and they would then be thinking,
29:49I mean, obviously to prove murder,
29:50they need to prove
29:51that she caused
29:52really serious harm to him
29:53and she intended to cause
29:54really serious harm to him.
29:56That would then prove murder,
29:58bearing in mind,
29:58he's dead,
29:59if they can prove
30:00that she inflicted the injury
30:02upon him
30:02that resulted in his death.
30:04Bantering sort of.
30:05During the police interviews,
30:07it becomes quickly apparent
30:08that for a person like Hanegret,
30:11violence is a perfectly acceptable tool
30:14to reinforce her dominance.
30:18I did hit him
30:19a bit harder sometimes.
30:22Hanegret Donnelly's police interviews
30:24are truly chilling.
30:26I don't think I've ever heard
30:28a criminal talk
30:29in such a dispassionate way
30:31about such a horrific crime.
30:33As I said,
30:34he never,
30:35it wasn't that he sort of fell over
30:40and lost consciousness.
30:42She dismisses her actions
30:44as banter
30:45and as normal behaviour
30:48in a relationship
30:49and really shows
30:51no sign of compassion
30:53or love
30:54for the man that she's killed.
30:55It was more like,
30:56I thought we had a chase
30:58around the kitchen table
30:59or something.
31:00It was more,
31:00you know,
31:01sometimes just,
31:04yeah.
31:05Sorry,
31:06what did you say?
31:06A chase around the kitchen table
31:08in a more sort of lighthearted way.
31:10It was quite disturbing to watch.
31:12She was incredibly calm,
31:14not visibly distressed
31:16and almost matter of fact
31:18in,
31:19she actually described
31:21what had happened
31:22at the house
31:23in almost a forensic level
31:25of detail.
31:26She would almost talk about
31:28that there would be banter
31:30between them
31:31whilst she was assaulting him.
31:33It was an incredibly
31:34cavalier view
31:35of what was
31:37a terrible
31:38systemic level of violence
31:40towards her husband.
31:41She came across
31:42as incredibly cold
31:44and detached
31:45from what must have been
31:46an entirely horrific situation.
31:52It sounds very much
31:54as if this woman
31:54was paranoid.
31:56I like to be informed
31:57as to what is going on.
31:59I don't like
32:01people talk behind my back.
32:03She was absolutely determined
32:05to be in control
32:06at all times
32:07and she didn't like
32:09any secrets going on.
32:10Now,
32:11that paranoia
32:12might have meant
32:12that she felt
32:13that people were scheming
32:14behind her back.
32:14Heaven knows
32:15they had reason
32:16to try and scheme
32:17and get away.
32:18So it was all part
32:19of this idea
32:20of keeping control.
32:21This was clearly
32:22a woman
32:22who was terrified
32:24of losing control.
32:26I get upset
32:27when I feel
32:28that there's
32:29some sort of
32:30things going on
32:32that I'm not told about.
32:35That's why
32:35she had to keep
32:36her family near her.
32:37She kept them
32:38under her thumb
32:39inside the home.
32:41Now,
32:42that would mean
32:42that they wouldn't feel
32:43they had anywhere
32:44they could go
32:45and speak freely,
32:47anywhere
32:47that they could be
32:48themselves
32:49and, of course,
32:51anybody
32:51that they could turn to
32:53for help.
32:54I've met lots
32:55of criminals
32:56over the course
32:57of my police career
32:58and I've researched
33:00even more
33:01as a result
33:02of my crime writing years.
33:04I don't think
33:05I've ever come across
33:06such a terrifying figure
33:08as Hannah Gret Donnelly.
33:10The lack of compassion
33:11and the extent
33:12of her abuse
33:14is truly horrific
33:16and, arguably,
33:18if I wrote
33:18a character that bad,
33:19I'm not sure
33:20anyone would believe
33:21that she could exist.
33:24The primary challenge
33:26for detectives
33:27was forcing
33:27a confession
33:28from Hannah Gret Donnelly.
33:31As they applied pressure,
33:33could the truth emerge
33:34from how she reacted
33:36to their questioning?
33:38Does that mean
33:39he's fallen down
33:40the whole,
33:40pretty much
33:41the whole flight of stairs?
33:42No, no.
33:43As I said,
33:44he...
33:44It's an interesting,
33:46gradual evolution
33:47of recognition
33:49that she just might
33:50have done something wrong.
33:52She fell against
33:53the crate.
33:53There was a crate
33:54and the crate got broken
33:56and then he cut himself.
34:01As Hannah Gret Donnelly
34:02tries to explain away
34:04her brutal treatment
34:05of Christopher,
34:06even the rolling pin attack,
34:08what does her body language betray?
34:11And how does it contradict
34:13her claims about his death?
34:15First of all,
34:16I tried to sort of
34:17sort things out with him
34:19in sort of a...
34:22bantering sort of way.
34:25Donnelly freely admits
34:26hitting Christopher.
34:27I punched him on his nose
34:30severely
34:30because I was so angry with him,
34:32but he didn't have
34:33such a big cut.
34:34He had just a small cut.
34:36Do you feel that
34:38hitting him over the head
34:39with a rolling pin,
34:40with a hairbrush,
34:41using your hands and fist
34:43is an appropriate reaction
34:46to him
34:49acting in that way,
34:50being in his strange moods?
34:53It's more like this
34:55helping him
34:57to come out
34:58of some sort of
35:00peculiar trance.
35:01Just how uncomfortable
35:03she's starting to feel,
35:04we can see in the way
35:05that she clenches
35:06her hands together
35:07as if trying to give herself
35:08some kind of reassurance.
35:12And there's the mystified
35:15shaking of the head.
35:17Does that mean he's fallen down
35:18pretty much the whole
35:20flight of stairs?
35:20No, no.
35:21As I said,
35:22he walked.
35:24These times that you've hit him,
35:27they weren't a result
35:30of him being
35:31violent to you?
35:33No.
35:35During the interviews,
35:37the detectives tried
35:38to establish
35:39whether Hannah Grett
35:40felt she was justified
35:42in doing what she did.
35:47She did not.
35:48Within your family,
35:49what would you say
35:50your role is?
36:00Yeah, I don't know.
36:02She pauses in annoyance.
36:04She's annoyed
36:04at being asked this question.
36:06She thinks it's none
36:07of the interviewer's business.
36:08She has never had
36:10to explain herself
36:11within her household.
36:12I'd like to know
36:14what's going on.
36:15So, but, yeah.
36:18Um, I like to be informed
36:20as to what is going on.
36:22I don't like, um,
36:24like when people talk
36:25behind my back.
36:27I was quite intrigued
36:29by the interview footage
36:32taken by the police
36:33that Hannah Grett
36:35never identifies
36:36a family member
36:37by their name.
36:38It's always a kind of anonymized.
36:41The environment
36:42doesn't include individuals.
36:44It's just simply
36:45the family.
36:46She likes to be informed
36:48about what's going on.
36:50but no one is ever mentioned.
36:52No one ever gets
36:53an identity.
36:55They lack identity
36:57in her language
36:58because she hasn't
37:00given them an identity.
37:01They merely are
37:03extensions of herself.
37:05I get upset when
37:07I feel that there's
37:09some sort of
37:10things going on
37:12that, uh,
37:13I'm not told about.
37:15There's no indication
37:16in her, in her face,
37:18her expression,
37:18her body language
37:19that she's aware
37:20that what she's saying
37:21is in any way
37:23potentially offensive.
37:26It's, it's more like this
37:32helping him
37:34to come out
37:35of some sort of
37:38peculiar trans,
37:39trans, no,
37:40I can't say it's a trans,
37:41but it's sort of peculiar
37:43you're, you're feeling,
37:45feeling strangely,
37:49I don't know.
37:50This is very interesting
37:52where for a moment
37:54she gives up
37:55for just a moment.
37:57She's exhausted
37:58by the questions.
37:59This is the first
38:00flicker of recognition
38:02to herself
38:03that she's guilty,
38:03but also that she may be,
38:05be being seen as guilty
38:06by the interviewer,
38:07that she may have lost
38:08her hold on control.
38:11The use of the word
38:12trans by Donnelly
38:14may have some element
38:15of truth behind it,
38:17again,
38:18because of Christopher's condition.
38:20Bronchopneumonia
38:21can cause a wide variety
38:22of symptoms,
38:23but of course
38:23it can have an impact
38:25on your mental state
38:26because if you're lacking
38:27oxygen to the brain
38:29and if you have germs
38:31flooding around your body,
38:33you can feel lightheaded,
38:35you can feel dizzy,
38:36you can feel confused,
38:37and it's entirely possible
38:38that your level
38:39of consciousness
38:40would drop
38:41so that you would enter
38:42what his wife described
38:45as a, quote,
38:46trance-like state.
38:49No normal wife
38:51would dream
38:51of dealing with that
38:53by hitting him
38:54with a rolling pin
38:55to knock it out of him.
38:58But that
38:59is exactly
39:00what she did,
39:01regardless
39:02of whether
39:03she's prepared
39:04to admit it.
39:06There's a lot of pride
39:08in the general
39:09body language here.
39:11There's a refusal
39:12to alter her expression,
39:14whatever the interviewer
39:16throws at her.
39:17The expression
39:18is just maintained
39:19throughout.
39:20There's no natural response
39:23and that's an indication
39:24of a lot of pride
39:26in the personality.
39:28Hannah Grepp
39:28had clearly lost touch
39:30with any shred
39:31of common decency.
39:33She would beat Christopher
39:35if he didn't answer
39:37a question quickly enough
39:38or if she felt
39:39he was in some kind
39:41of trance.
39:42She was evil.
39:44She terrified him
39:46and she ran that house
39:49through fear
39:50and intimidation.
39:52One can only imagine
39:54what horrors
39:56the children
39:57may have seen
39:59or heard.
40:04I feel sorry for him
40:05but again
40:05I just feel
40:08I know how he was feeling
40:09at that time.
40:11I knew my body
40:12was shutting down
40:13and I was waiting
40:14to die.
40:15I just thought
40:15well the next time
40:16I get stabbed
40:18the next time
40:19I get hit
40:19it's going to be
40:20in the wrong place
40:21or the knife's
40:22going to go
40:22a little bit deeper
40:23or go in the wrong way
40:25and eventually
40:28I just
40:29my body
40:29will shut down
40:30and I can completely
40:31I don't know
40:33I'm uncomfortable
40:33thinking about it.
40:36Dehumanising Christopher
40:37which is precisely
40:38what Hanegret did
40:40helped her
40:41justify the beating
40:43she inflicted.
40:45So Hanegret
40:46is what we call
40:47a victim
40:48as object
40:49murderer
40:49meaning that
40:51she doesn't see
40:52her victim
40:52as fully human
40:53so that actually
40:55they're not
40:56that relevant
40:56to her
40:57as an individual
40:58in any kind
40:59of emotional sense
41:00and the murders
41:01the murders
41:02in these types
41:02of cases
41:03can often be
41:03the incidental
41:05the consequences
41:06simply of her
41:08enactment
41:09of her absolute
41:10control
41:10on an object
41:12the murder
41:12is often incidental.
41:14I get the distinct
41:17impression
41:17that
41:18because of
41:19the systematic
41:21abuse
41:22that Christopher
41:23had suffered
41:24that he
41:26no longer
41:27has
41:27in Hanegret's
41:29mind
41:29the status
41:30of being
41:31human
41:32that he's
41:33been reduced
41:34to being
41:34an object
41:35he's denied
41:37his humanity
41:38and because
41:39he's denied
41:40his humanity
41:41that perversely
41:43will allow
41:44the abuse
41:45to escalate
41:47because once
41:48you deny
41:48that someone
41:49is the same
41:50as you
41:51that someone
41:52is lesser
41:53than you
41:54it is much
41:56easier
41:56to cause
41:57them harm
41:59Hanegret's
42:00initial wounding
42:01charge
42:01is escalated
42:02to murder
42:03after all
42:04the forensic
42:05post-mortem
42:06and interview
42:07evidence
42:08is collated
42:09despite
42:10the massive
42:11amount
42:11of evidence
42:12she enters
42:13a not guilty
42:15plea
42:17she also
42:18maintained the
42:18fact that she
42:19never intended
42:19to kill her
42:20husband
42:24despite her
42:25not guilty
42:25plea
42:25she was
42:26found
42:26unanimously
42:27guilty
42:28by the jury
42:28on the
42:2920th of
42:29March
42:292019
42:30and sentenced
42:31to life
42:32imprisonment
42:32with a
42:32minimum
42:33term
42:33of 16
42:33years
42:47Hanegret
42:48Donnelly
42:49is
42:49statistically
42:50a very
42:51rare
42:51killer
42:52coercion
42:53and murder
42:53are much
42:54more often
42:55perpetrated
42:56by men
42:57in domestic
42:58abuse
42:58cases
42:59but as
43:00Alex
43:01Skeel
43:01discovered
43:02violence
43:03can come
43:04from
43:04anybody
43:06Christopher
43:07Donnelly
43:07discovered
43:08that too
43:10at the
43:11start
43:11of our
43:12relationship
43:12it was
43:13the first
43:13relationship
43:14that I
43:14had
43:14so everything
43:16felt normal
43:17but obviously
43:18now I can
43:18look back
43:19and see
43:19things and
43:19go well
43:20that wasn't
43:20but at
43:21the time
43:22I was
43:23happy
43:23it was
43:23nice to
43:24sort of
43:24tell your
43:25mates
43:26that you
43:26went out
43:26at the
43:27weekend
43:27and
43:28just
43:29felt
43:29normal
43:30but
43:30obviously
43:31things
43:31steadily
43:32gets worse
43:33worse
43:33and worse
43:33and worse
43:34and worse
43:34and worse
43:34and worse
43:34and then
43:37I just
43:38find it
43:38weird
43:38that I
43:39was
43:41sort of
43:42young
43:43person
43:44in sixth
43:44form
43:45and then
43:45five years
43:45later
43:46for no fault
43:48of my own
43:48I was
43:50about two
43:51weeks away
43:51ten days
43:52from dying
43:53and I could
43:54feel that
43:54happening
43:56but it
43:56wasn't my
43:57fault
43:57that that
43:57was happening
43:58and it
43:58was just
44:00a terrible
44:02place to
44:02be in
44:03and there's
44:03nothing I
44:04could have
44:04done about
44:04it
44:05because I
44:05literally
44:06had no
44:06money
44:10Hanigret Donnelly
44:12had beaten
44:12and coerced
44:14her husband
44:14taking complete
44:15control of his
44:16life and
44:17their children
44:18it was the
44:19years of
44:20degradation
44:20and abuse
44:21that led
44:22directly to
44:23his physical
44:24collapse
44:24when he
44:26contracted
44:26pneumonia
44:27his life
44:28was on
44:29the line
44:29not
44:30because of
44:31the illness
44:32but because
44:33of his
44:34wife
44:37it might
44:37be easy
44:39to assume
44:39that the
44:40most shocking
44:41element of
44:42this case
44:42is that
44:43the offender
44:43is a woman
44:44we're perhaps
44:45very used
44:46to domestic
44:46violence
44:47being committed
44:48by men
44:49but men
44:51are victims
44:51of domestic
44:52violence
44:53far too
44:53often
44:53and what
44:54this case
44:55shows
44:55is that
44:56this is
44:56a very
44:57real problem
44:57that needs
44:58to be
44:59addressed
44:59regardless
45:00of the
45:00genders
45:01of the
45:01people
45:01involved
45:02Hanigret Donnelly
45:04will not
45:05be eligible
45:05for parole
45:06until
45:072034
45:09safeguards
45:10are now
45:11in place
45:12for the
45:12couple's
45:13four children
45:15Hanigret Donnelly
45:16wasn't
45:18convicted
45:18of murdering
45:20her husband
45:21because of
45:22a single
45:22blow
45:23she was
45:24convicted
45:24of murdering
45:25Christopher
45:26Donnelly
45:26after years
45:28of prolonged
45:29and systematic
45:31physical abuse
45:33you know
45:35there are already
45:36a number
45:37of pressures
45:37to keep
45:38the victims
45:39of domestic
45:40abuse
45:41silent
45:41and I think
45:43we have to
45:43acknowledge
45:44through this
45:45case
45:45and through
45:46other cases
45:47which are
45:47similar
45:48that there
45:49are equal
45:50if not
45:51greater
45:51pressures
45:52on men
45:53who are
45:53suffering
45:54domestic
45:54abuse
45:55to keep
45:56silent
45:57too
46:02as
46:27a
46:27a
46:27good
46:27as
46:27as
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