Latest news with #Staffordshire
BBC News
28 minutes ago
- BBC News
Louis Price was 'scared' of ex accused of Christmas murder
A dad-of-six who was allegedly murdered on Christmas Day by his "abusive" ex-partner was "scared" of her, a friend of the victim has told her Carless, 33, is on trial at Stafford Crown Court, where she denies murdering 31-year-old Louis Price by stabbing him in the heart. Prosecutors suggested the attack had been "motivated by anger and jealousy and fuelled by cocaine and alcohol" after a friend sent her a picture of his dating profile on allege Ms Carless, of Haling Way in Cannock, Staffordshire, took a kitchen knife in a taxi from her home to Mr Price's parents' address in Elm Road, Norton Canes, where she expected to find him with a woman. CCTV showed Ms Carless "stalking" him around the garden before he was later found with a single stab wound to the chest on the conservatory evidence on the second day of the trial, friend Demi-Louise Deakin said Mr Price had confided in her about his on-off relationship with Ms Carless when they attended a funeral at the end of November by prosecution counsel Jonas Hankin KC what Mr Price had said, Miss Deakin said: "He said he was scared of Kirsty and if he didn't leave soon something bad would happen to him."He said she can be violent towards him."A neighbour told the court she had called the police after witnessing Ms Carless chasing and hitting Mr Price in the ribs with a metal pole outside the house while he had his arms up protecting his head. Jurors were shown police body-worn video footage from when officers attended the defendant's home on 11 November Price had phoned 999 to say she had poured bleach over tracksuits worth £400, thrown a glass candle holder at him, pulled him down the stairs and choked a witness statement after the incident, he said the relationship "on the whole, has been abusive".He said: "She has constantly been abusive towards me, stopped me doing things I enjoy like football, and physically abused me."Ms Carless denies murder and possessing an offensive weapon in a public place in relation to the fatal incident on 25 December also also denies one count of intentional strangulation and one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm in relation to the incident on November 11 trial continues. Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Man told friend he was scared of ex accused of stabbing him to death
A father-of-six who was allegedly murdered on Christmas Day by his 'abusive' ex-partner told a friend he was scared of her and feared 'something bad' would happen to him if he did not leave the relationship, a court has heard. Kirsty Carless, 33, is accused of plunging a knife into 31-year-old Louis Price's heart in the early hours of December 25 2024 in an attack 'motivated by anger and jealousy and fuelled by cocaine and alcohol' after a friend sent her a picture of his dating profile on Tinder, Stafford Crown Court heard. Prosecutors allege Carless, of Haling Way in Cannock, Staffordshire, took a kitchen knife in a taxi from her home to Mr Price's parents' address in Elm Road, Norton Canes, where she expected to find him with a woman. CCTV showed Carless 'stalking' him around the garden before he was later found with a single stab wound to the chest on the conservatory floor. The court was told Mr Price was considered by police to be 'at very high risk of domestic abuse' before his death. Giving evidence on the second day of the trial, friend Demi-Louise Deakin said Mr Price had confided in her about his on-off relationship with Carless when they attended a funeral at the end of November 2024. Asked by prosecution counsel Jonas Hankin KC what Mr Price had said, Miss Deakin said: 'He said he was scared of Kirsty and if he didn't leave soon something bad would happen to him… 'He said she can be violent towards him.' Miss Deakin, who lived near the defendant, said she also witnessed another incident where Carless allegedly poured bleach over his clothes and threw a shoe out of the window which hit him on the head. Another neighbour also told the court she had called the police on another occasion after witnessing Carless chasing and hitting Mr Price in the ribs with a metal pole outside the house while he had his arms up protecting his head. Jurors were shown police body-worn video footage from when officers attended Carless' address on November 11 2024, after Mr Price phoned 999 to say she had poured bleach over tracksuits worth £400, had thrown a glass candle holder at him, pulled him down the stairs and choked him. As he was moved away from the house by one of the officers, Mr Price appeared to become emotional, saying: 'It's f****** embarrassing … it can't keep happening, man.' In a witness statement after the incident, he said the relationship 'on the whole, has been abusive'. He said: 'She has constantly been abusive towards me, stopped me doing things I enjoy like football, and physically abused me.' He added: 'She has abused me for years now yet I'm always the one that gets arrested.' The trial was told of several previous incidents in which the police had been called, including an incident on March 5 2023 in which Carless had said Mr Price had punched her and been violent and he was arrested. Carless retracted her statement in July that year, telling police: 'It was 50/50 and we hit each other, I hurt him as much as he hurt me, I felt so pressured to make it sound one-sided by my social worker at the time. 'It is wrong what I said in my original statement, I don't want to go to court and lie about what happened.' In another incident on September 26 2023, Carless called police to say her partner had hit her before the call ended and later claimed a neighbour had stolen her phone and pretended to be her when officers traced her. The court was also told Carless admitted to police she had made up allegations that Mr Price had grabbed her by the throat three times after she confronted him about messages on his phone in November 2023, telling officers it was a 'way of getting back at him for speaking to other women'. Carless denies murder and possessing an offensive weapon in a public place in relation to the fatal incident on December 25 2024 and one count of intentional strangulation and one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm in relation to the incident on November 11 2024. The trial continues.
The Independent
3 hours ago
- The Independent
Man told friend he was scared of ex accused of stabbing him to death
A father-of-six who was allegedly murdered on Christmas Day by his 'abusive' ex-partner told a friend he was scared of her and feared 'something bad' would happen to him if he did not leave the relationship, a court has heard. Kirsty Carless, 33, is accused of plunging a knife into 31-year-old Louis Price's heart in the early hours of December 25 2024 in an attack 'motivated by anger and jealousy and fuelled by cocaine and alcohol' after a friend sent her a picture of his dating profile on Tinder, Stafford Crown Court heard. Prosecutors allege Carless, of Haling Way in Cannock, Staffordshire, took a kitchen knife in a taxi from her home to Mr Price's parents' address in Elm Road, Norton Canes, where she expected to find him with a woman. CCTV showed Carless 'stalking' him around the garden before he was later found with a single stab wound to the chest on the conservatory floor. The court was told Mr Price was considered by police to be 'at very high risk of domestic abuse' before his death. Giving evidence on the second day of the trial, friend Demi-Louise Deakin said Mr Price had confided in her about his on-off relationship with Carless when they attended a funeral at the end of November 2024. Asked by prosecution counsel Jonas Hankin KC what Mr Price had said, Miss Deakin said: 'He said he was scared of Kirsty and if he didn't leave soon something bad would happen to him… 'He said she can be violent towards him.' Miss Deakin, who lived near the defendant, said she also witnessed another incident where Carless allegedly poured bleach over his clothes and threw a shoe out of the window which hit him on the head. Another neighbour also told the court she had called the police on another occasion after witnessing Carless chasing and hitting Mr Price in the ribs with a metal pole outside the house while he had his arms up protecting his head. Jurors were shown police body-worn video footage from when officers attended Carless' address on November 11 2024, after Mr Price phoned 999 to say she had poured bleach over tracksuits worth £400, had thrown a glass candle holder at him, pulled him down the stairs and choked him. As he was moved away from the house by one of the officers, Mr Price appeared to become emotional, saying: 'It's f****** embarrassing … it can't keep happening, man.' In a witness statement after the incident, he said the relationship 'on the whole, has been abusive'. He said: 'She has constantly been abusive towards me, stopped me doing things I enjoy like football, and physically abused me.' He added: 'She has abused me for years now yet I'm always the one that gets arrested.' The trial was told of several previous incidents in which the police had been called, including an incident on March 5 2023 in which Carless had said Mr Price had punched her and been violent and he was arrested. Carless retracted her statement in July that year, telling police: 'It was 50/50 and we hit each other, I hurt him as much as he hurt me, I felt so pressured to make it sound one-sided by my social worker at the time. 'It is wrong what I said in my original statement, I don't want to go to court and lie about what happened.' In another incident on September 26 2023, Carless called police to say her partner had hit her before the call ended and later claimed a neighbour had stolen her phone and pretended to be her when officers traced her. The court was also told Carless admitted to police she had made up allegations that Mr Price had grabbed her by the throat three times after she confronted him about messages on his phone in November 2023, telling officers it was a 'way of getting back at him for speaking to other women'. Carless denies murder and possessing an offensive weapon in a public place in relation to the fatal incident on December 25 2024 and one count of intentional strangulation and one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm in relation to the incident on November 11 2024. The trial continues.
BBC News
13 hours ago
- Politics
- BBC News
Gnosall and Eccleshall by-election to replace Reform councillor
Voters go to the polls in part of Staffordshire on Thursday to replace a Reform UK councillor who stepped down just two weeks after the local Titley, who was elected in Gnosall and Eccleshall, was part of a wave of councillors that swept the party to power on Staffordshire County Council in May, taking 49 of the 62 seats, and wiping out the previous Tory he faced criticism over a post on Facebook in March that called on the Navy to intercept small boats attempting to reach Britain and use a "volley of gun fire aimed at sinking them".Reform stood by Titley, but said he had stepped down because he had faced personal abuse. Party leader Nigel Farage was asked on a visit to Stafford last month about whether he considered the cost of this by-election, about £27,000 in taxpayers' money, "wasteful spending".He said: "It's unfortunate. This guy said some things on social media he shouldn't have said, as a result of that came under some pretty abusive online pressure, and would rather it hadn't happened."Boundary changes in the Gnosall and Eccleshall ward has meant campaigning in villages rich in Conservative, Reform, and Green voters. Candidates tell me it could be a three-way race. The result is expected to be announced on Friday. Boundary changes in the Gnosall and Eccleshall ward has meant campaigning in villages rich in Conservative, Reform, and Green voters. Candidates tell me it could be a three-way race. The result is expected to be announced on Friday. Who is standing? Reform candidate Ray Barron has previously served as a borough and county councillor. He was a member of the Conservative party until 2022, when he became an independent, then joined Reform last year. Unsuccessful in the county election on 1 May, Barron said he could not have worked harder to campaign for this seat, and that he thought it would be a "coin toss" over who won said if he won the seat he would use his experience as an ex-county councillor to help his politically inexperienced Reform colleagues. While Labour start from a low base on the county council, having just one councillor representing the party in Staffordshire, their candidate Leah Elston-Thompson is hopeful. Following the election of a Labour MP in July 2024 when the party saw a landslide victory, Elston-Thompson said if she was elected in Gnosall and Eccleshall, she would carry on the good work the government does on a local level. Conservative Jeremy Pert is hoping to use this opportunity to win his seat back. There were just 27 votes separating him and Titley in said this by-election was about two things: holding the new Reform administration to account; and providing a strong local advocate to make sure the area "doesn't get overrun" with more than 1,000 houses planned for development. Pert served on the county council for eight years in the Eccleshall ward. Green party councillor Scott Spencer is looking to build on the momentum the Greens have picked up since winning their first ever seat on the county council in May. He said "on a Reform-led council I would bring evidence based solutions, not empty promises." He added, in his view, "Greens can win here".
The Sun
13 hours ago
- Health
- The Sun
Our beautiful girls never got to grow up – they died hours after GPs failed to spot the warning signs of common killer
AS Laura Topping looks at the family photos that line the hallway, she pauses on her little girl, Ella. 'Ella should be 16 and thinking about prom at the moment,' says Laura. 'But she'll forever be four years old.' 8 8 Laura, 44, has watched her other children grow up without their big sister. 'Her younger brother Ryan is 13 and she has a sister Sadie, 11, who she never met. 'Their family photos on the walls at home show their whole childhoods so far, Ella's stop at the age of four.' Ella suddenly died from sepsis in March 2013, after showing clear warning signs. She had been unwell for a week, with symptoms of a typical kid's bug, visiting the GP at least four times. But Laura, from Plymouth, says her death could have been avoided had the medics who treated her considered sepsis. 'Ella was perfect,' she tells Sun Health. 'She adored the colour purple, and loved to dress up as princesses and was a bubbly, smiley little girl. 'Ella was rarely unwell and always considered fit and healthy.' Ella's story is painfully similar to Mia Glynn, 8 - and those of countless other children. Tragic Mia died on December 9, 2022, just 24 hours after seeing the GP about a cough. Dad Soron Glynn, 40, from Biddulph, Staffordshire, says: 'I remember a senior doctor saying they'd done everything they could. The signs and symptoms of sepsis to look out for, according to The UK Sepsis Trust 'We had no idea what had happened. 'As well as grieving our incredible daughter, we had police at the house taking pictures in case anything untoward had happened. 'It took six days for sepsis to be recognised as the cause of death.' Dr Ron Daniels, founder and chief medical advisor, at The UK Sepsis Trust, says: 'Every day we hear about healthy, young people who develop sepsis and, in what feels like the blink of an eye, lose their life or are left with life-changing after-effects.' Sepsis kills five people every hour in the UK, and is responsible for more deaths each year (48,000) than breast, bowel and prostate cancer combined. Yet only 31 per cent of the UK population feel confident in identifying sepsis symptoms if they or someone else were affected, according to The UK Sepsis Trust. Sepsis, which many may know as the old term of blood poisoning, is when the body overreacts to an infection, rather than helping to fight it. This can reduce the blood supply to vital organs such as the brain, heart, and kidneys, eventually leading to multiple organ failure. 'Sepsis arises in people of any age, whether or not they've got an underlying illness,' says Dr Daniels. 'And although it always starts with an infection such as pneumonia, chest infections or urinary tract infections, it's unknown why some people develop sepsis in response to these common infections when others don't. 'As a result, sepsis presents very differently in each patient and can be really challenging to identify.' But though sepsis is hard to spot - due to the fact it mimics so many other conditions - doing so quickly is crucial. The risk of death from sepsis increases by 1-2 per cent with every hour that passes without treatment, says The UK Sepsis Trust. When Ella fell ill at playgroup on February 25, 2013, she became clingy to Laura, an assistant to a motivational speaker, and had a high temperature. 8 8 8 'She became more feverish as the day went on and started vomiting throughout the night,' Laura says. 'My husband Andrew and I took her to the GP the next morning as her temperature was getting hard to control with paracetamol and ibuprofen. 'But the doctor said it was a viral infection and we were 'doing the right thing' medicating to keep the temperature down and symptoms at bay.' After another unsettled night, Laura took Ella back to the GP on February 27, after she'd been very uncomfortable and unable to sleep. She was told again it was a viral infection. 'I felt like we were being fobbed off,' recalls Laura. 'The next day Ella woke with a noticeable rash on her face, right-hand side and upper arm. 'We went back to the GP in the morning, who diagnosed rubella, which is a viral infection and not treatable with antibiotics.' By that afternoon, Laura couldn't touch Ella because she was in such discomfort. Lying on the sofa, with a rash progressively getting worse, Laura took her daughter back to the GP for the fourth time who gave her antibiotics for an ear infection. 'By Friday morning (March 1) she was hallucinating so I called an ambulance,' says Laura. 'She was limp. She'd developed a bright red rash all over her body, with swollen lips and eyes. 'When we got to the hospital, they treated it like a contagious disease and we were in isolation. The 6 key symptoms Dr Ron Daniels says: 'There are six key symptoms you can look for, and they spell the word sepsis.' S: Slurred speech or confusion E: Extreme pain in the muscles or joints P: Passing no urine in a day S: Severe breathlessness I: 'It feels like I'm going to die' - 'which people really do say,' says Dr Daniels. S: Skin that's mottled, discoloured or very pale. 'If you spot any one of those six signs in the context of infection, you should go straight to A&E,' says Dr Daniels. 'Our Sepsis Savvy resources will equip you with the knowledge you need to seek urgent treatment at the right time." Visit The Sepsis Trust for more information. 'The consultant paediatrician suspected Kawasaki disease which is a condition that causes blood vessel inflammation.' Ella stayed in hospital overnight but by the next morning, she was totally unresponsive. 'They thought it could be meningitis,' says Laura. 'Before they could do a lumbar puncture or CT scan though, she went into cardiac arrest. 'The doctors and nurses worked for hours to bring her back but it was too late.' It took weeks for sepsis to be identified as the cause of Ella's death. 'They told us it was myocarditis, which is an infection in the lining of the heart. It was only when I read the actual postmortem I saw it was sepsis - no one told us.' Ella was rarely unwell and always considered fit and healthy Laura Topping Derriford Hospital in Plymouth, where Ella was treated, expressed its condolences to the family. Darryn Allcorn, Chief Nurse and Director of Integrated Professions, said: "There were missed opportunities and we fully accept the conclusions reached by the Coroner. "We enhanced the training of staff around sepsis and the utilisation of Paediatric Early Warning Scores (PEWS) in 2015. We know that these changes do not undo the loss suffered by Ella's family, and we are truly sorry for the pain and grief they have endured.' But Laura says she'll never know whether her daughter would have survived had sepsis been identified sooner. Similarly, it took days for the parents of Mia to be told the cause of her death was sepsis. 8 Dad Soron says: 'It sounds like a cliché, but she was full of energy, bright and inquisitive. 'Just months before she died, I was tucking her into bed one night and she asked me 'why are we here?' It was such a big question. I remember giving her a hug and saying we were put here to enjoy ourselves, enjoy life and be whatever you want to be.' Mia never got to grow up and realise her potential though. On December 5, she came home from school with a sore throat. Soron and Mia's mum Katie, 38, didn't think much of it and after being dosed up with Calpol, Mia went to school the next day. By December 8, with Mia getting worse, Katie took her to the GP. 'She'd been eating less and was struggling with fluids,' says Soron. 'The doctor said we were doing the right thing but if it got worse to come back.' Soron and Katie had no idea at the time just how bad things would get for their precious first-born daughter. The afternoon of December 8, Katie took Mia back to the doctors who gave her antibiotics. But by 1.30am, Mia was unresponsive and the pair called an ambulance. While Mia was rushed to hospital with three medics in an ambulance, she went into cardiac arrest and tragically lost her life. 'Misdiagnosed all the time' Dr Daniels says parents need to be listened to to prevent the needless loss of lives like Mia and Ella's. It's why last year, Martha's Rule was introduced in NHS England. Martha Mills died in 2021 after developing sepsis in hospital, having been admitted with a pancreatic injury after falling off her bike. Martha's family's concerns about her deteriorating condition were not responded to, and in 2023 a coroner ruled that Martha, aged 13, would probably have survived had she been moved to intensive care earlier. 8 8 In the wake of Martha's death, a new law was introduced, dubbed 'Martha's Rules' giving parents or guardians the right to an urgent second medical opinion if they have concerns over treatment. Dr Daniels says: 'It's critical that healthcare professionals listen when patients' loved ones and carers express concerns. 'There have been so many sepsis cases in which outcomes could have been improved or lives could have been saved – it's more important than ever that members of the public feel empowered to act as advocates when their loved ones are unwell. 'Public recognition of sepsis as a medical emergency has improved massively over the last few years, but we still need much better awareness of the signs and symptoms of sepsis.' Soron and Katie founded aiM charity in memory of their daughter Mia in March last year. It raises awareness of sepsis and offers bereavement support for those affected by the condition too. Soron says spending 15 minutes learning about the symptoms of sepsis could save a life. 'It's a condition that can be hidden by other things,' he says. 'It's misdiagnosed all the time but learning about the signs and knowing what to look for could mean other families won't have to go through what ours has.'
