Life for cop who throttled wife with one hand
A POLICE inspector has been jailed for at least 19 years for the “brutal killing” of his detective constable wife.
Darren McKie, 43, was sentenced yesterday for the murder of wife Leanne, 39.
The Greater Manchester Police officer admitted the manslaughter of his wife, who was found in Poynton Lake, Cheshire, on September 29 last year, but was found guilty of her murder last Friday.
Handing him a term of life imprisonment at at Chester Crown Court, judge Mr Justice Spencer said: “You strangled her to death in the family home. It was a cruel killing.
Callous
“Then, abusing your knowledge with criminal investigations and abusing the public trust in you as a senior police officer, you set about disposing of your wife’s body in a callous and despicable way.”
The judge said McKie and his wife appeared to have a “perfect marriage and a perfect family”.
But he said, the “spectre of serious and constant debt” was in the background and the couple were living beyond their means.
He said that McKie resorted to “subterfuge and fraud” to hide the debts, said to be more than £115,000, from his wife but she found out about it, leading to her slaying at her Wilmslow home.
He throttled her with one hand while covering her mouth with the other to stifle screams.
Mr Justice Spencer said: “She must have been aware that she was being strangled to death, in the family home. It was an awful way to die.”
The court heard McKie put his wife’s body in the boot of her red Mini, later taking it to Poynton Lake.
He he had denied the killing but changed his his plea to admit her manslaughter nine days into the case.
Mr Justice Spencer said: “I am sure that you did so as a damage limitation exercise.”