‘Hysterical’ woman stabbed partner and attacked him with hammer in row over £20

A woman tried gouging out her partner’s eyeball after slashing him a knife and hammer over a £20 dispute.

Rebecca Smith, 41, reached for a six-inch kitchen knife and began stabbing and slashing her victim’s face who refused to hand over cash.

The man who tried to escape the onslaught says he “cannot trust another woman” again after Smith’s brutal attack in Immingham, Lincolnshire, GrimsbyLive reports.

Smith demanded £20 from her partner on July 24 last year and took his methadone prescription as “punishment” for him not telling her where an amount of Valium was.

When the man threatened to leave, she wounded him nine times with a knife and then “pushed her thumb into his eye and he screamed at her to stop”.

To stop him from running to safety, Smith locked the back door and followed him into the living room before grabbing a hammer which she used to fracture his elbow.

Grimsby Crown Court heard that the man was “saved” by a telephone call from a nurse practitioner looking to get hold of Smith.

Ian Goldsack, prosecuting, told the court: “He told the nurse to call the police and said, ‘She’s got a knife. She’s going to kill me.’

“He was bleeding profusely.”

The man escaped through a ground floor window and made it as far as a nearby shop for someone to intervene and dial 999.

Mr Goldsack said: “She was still demanding the money. When the police arrived she was described as being hysterical and possibly under the influence of something.”

Her victim had to undergo surgery to repair the fracture to his elbow.

The court heard this was not the first time Smith had attacked the man who told Grimsby Crown Court in a victim impact statement on Thursday: “I feel like I can’t trust another woman for a while. I thought I knew her well enough. She’s not safe around children or anyone because if she can snap like that it could be anyone she snaps at.”

Mitigating, Craig Lowe, told the court Smith had suffered from a difficult childhood and a personality disorder, which was outlined in a psychiatric report provided to the court.

Judge Ahmed Nadim said: “You used three different methods of harm. You used the knife, you pressed your thumb into his eye and you used the hammer. Your intention was to cause greater harm than you did.”

He initially handed her a sentence of ten years imprisonment, but later called the case back and changed it to nine years, extended by three years for dangerousness.

She was told she must also serve a concurrent sentence of eight months for the breach of a previous suspended sentence.

If you have been affected by issues of domestic violence or coercive control you can call Refuge‘s 24-Hour National Domestic Abuse Helpline for free. The number is 0808 2000 247