UK - Scarlett Vickers (14) stabbed to death at home in Darlington. Parents charged with murder (5 July '24)


Forensic pathologist Jennifer Bolton said it was "practically impossible" for a thrown kitchen knife to have caused the injury.

She said kitchen knives were not designed to be thrown and the blade would have had to strike at a 90 degree angle to pass through Scarlett's pyjama top and into her chest, otherwise it would have rebounded off.

Instead Dr Bolton concluded the knife was being held "tightly" with a firm grip when it injured Scarlett.
 
I just want to pop up an image of the human body as such to try and visualise where the blade had to enter to go between her 5th and 6th rib, through her lung and into her heart.
They say it went in at a 90-degree angle... so the line is roughly how I imagine it went in.

1737120965336.png

Image from here

From this I find it really hard to believe he was just chucking things about and it just happened to land so deep in her. :/
 
I've summarised and bolded what I think are key parts of the Teeside Live article.

MOO is that both parents are lying through their teeth. I feel like a version of number 3 is the closest to the actual truth. JMO

The prosecution say the defendant gave three different accounts, at least, before his formal police interview.

1. he had been throwing a knife
2. he had been throwing other items
3. Scarlett lunging towards the knife

  • Sarah Hall made the 999 call and during the call Sarah said they were "messing about" and her partner "threw something" and didn't realise.
  • …the paramedic said Vickers and Scarlett's mum were unsure how the injury occurred and then said Scarlett and her dad were play fighting and were 'chucking knives at each other'.
  • The defendant picked up a knife on the kitchen counter and said "We were messing and play fighting and she lunged towards me and it just went in.", he added.
  • The police constable heard Sarah Hall say he's picked a spatula up and not realised the knife was with it at the same time.
  • The defendant said we were cooking tea, ****ing about, playing around and started throwing objects at each other.
  • Sarah Hall then said she'd taken the knife out to cut the garlic bread. He picked the spatula up at the same time and did not realise the knife was with it.
  • when Sarah and the defendant were asked about how deep the knife had gone into Scarlett's body they were "not aware" of how deep the knife had gone.
  • …the defendant said: "It wasn't even hard, I don't understand" and said there "wasn't even any effort
  • when the defendant was arrested …he said "We were just playing in the kitchen, I don't know how this has happened. One minute I was cooking and the next there was blood gushing out of her chest."
  • the defendant described Sarah cooking tea, he was sitting at one end of the breakfast table and Scarlett was at the other. He describes Scarlett throwing grapes at him and he went to throw grapes back.
  • He said he went to get her.
  • Scarlett pushed him away, so he grabbed the tongs and threw them at her.
  • The defendant described picking the tongs up and throwing them "almost blindly" over his left shoulder
  • The defendant said Scarlett said “argh” and saw all the blood coming down the side and she fell on the floor and he asked Sarah to call an ambulance
  • The defendant denied telling paramedics he had thrown a knife, …and did not engage with the paramedics and did not pull the knife out.
  • Dr Bolton said … she would have become unconscious before death but would not have collapsed immediately.
  • Dr Bolton says that in the vast majority of stabbings, the person responsible generally removes the knife. She says that it is unlikely the knife simply fell out of Scarlett…
  • Ms Hall says Scarlett is bleeding from her left or right side and that there was a "fun fight" where something was thrown. She then says she is "not sure".
  • (Vickers)…told police that they were throwing grapes at each other in the kitchen, and he grabbed a pair of tongs - not a spatula - and threw them at her “that’s it, that’s all I did”.
  • He says he just “chucked” the tongs at her but “obviously, I’ve picked the knife up…we were horseplaying”.
  • “We were always fighting and carrying on. We’ve done it many times…she gave me like a push and I thought ‘right, I’ll get you with the tongs’.”
  • He says they then started throwing grapes for “a bit of fun”.
  • She then got off her chair, and Vickers was pushed back - he said he then threw the tongs at her - “All of a sudden she shouted…there was a delay…then we saw the blood”.
  • He added: “I saw the blood and rang 999, the colour was going and she was falling to the floor. I passed the phone to Sarah, I was trying to do mouth to mouth.”
(second police interview)
  • Vickers says…that he was not throwing knives around, and does not know why the paramedic said that. “No knives have been thrown anywhere” he says.
  • He says that the paramedic’s account that Vickers said he had been throwing knives was “not true”.
 
More details in this DM article. It ends by saying Simon Vickers will give evidence on Monday.

 
Hmmm....
Drugs and 2 bottles of wine...

I bet there was a drunken argument going on and the stabbing allegedly was the result of a fit of rage.
I cannot remember how many times I read about tragedies like this.

Drunken arguments in the kitchen.

By the way:

" 'Simon Vickers will bear moral responsibility for his daughter's death for the rest of his life'."

These are exactly the same words during Sara Sharif trial.
The lawyer of murderer used them.

Terrible déjà vu :(

JMO

Based on DM link above.
 
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I’m just having a hard time understanding “mucking around” by throwing kitchen utensils at each other. They talk like this is something that is commonplace in their home. SMH

It’s just weird. Of all the places in a home to be careful the kitchen is the place.

Also, he says he the unluckiest person in the world. I guess I would be more inclined to say Scarlett is the unluckiest. She did lose her life after all. Sheesh! Read the room buddy.

MOO
 
I don't think any defendant in the history of criminal law has ever been fully honest about the amount of alcohol/drugs they had consumed at the time of a crime they are alleged to have committed!

JMO

This is exactly the same
when a doctor asks a patient how many cigarettes a day the person smokes.
"Only a few Sir" ;)
 
Found this, published today. Not too much new info, other than the pathologist's detail and her being cross examined




Forensic pathologist Jennifer Bolton concluded the knife was being held "tightly" with a firm grip when it injured Scarlett.

Dr Bolton said the knife passed between two ribs and pierced through a lung into her heart causing major blood loss and would have required only mild force to penetrate so deep.

She said Scarlett would have fallen unconscious and died within minutes of the blow.

Under cross-examination by Mr Vicker's barrister Nicholas Lumley KC, Dr Bolton said
Scarlett could have survived had the knife gone a millimetre or two either side of where it ended up.




Tightly, with a firm grip.

So not tossed playfully then whilst mucking about with the kitchen utensils, as one does, quite naturally, after a long day of drinking and watching the footy.

Are we still on the version where the knife was sat alongside a chunk of garlic bread and thrown with it? Or the tongs were? Or the grapes? Or some other utterly harmless item that couldn't possibly have resulted in an 11cm fatal stab wound?

This is such an odd case. How drunk was this man?

EDIT: So at least a few bottles of wine drunk. Plus some cannabis. And maybe some other substance that wasn't quite cannabis.

As others have noted, this fella may be a little less unlucky than Scarlett, who died. In agony. Amid the grapes and tongs and garlic bread and wine and drugs and kitchen knives and, just possibly, the ongoing DV.
 
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