Facing life, killer who claimed wife taunted him over ‘lesbian f ling’
AN estate agent who stabbed his wife to death after claiming she had taunted him over an alleged lesbian tryst was facing life in jail last night.
David Clark, also told jurors his wife Melanie, 44, had belittled him over the size of his penis.
He launched the attack after he claimed the mother-of-four had told him about an encounter with Katie Bastians, 31, the grown-up daughter of a close friend, in the Clarks’ former marital bed.
But jurors rejected his account of being subjected to sexual humiliation and cruel remarks before the killing in December – just minutes before the country marked the New Year.
Yesterday racy pictures of Miss Bastians emerged – showing the lesbian journalist in a series of poses with her fiancée – including shots of the pair in glittery black underwear before a Mardi Gras parade.
South African-born Clark, 49, was convicted by a ten to one majority of murder at the end of a three-week trial, and will be sentenced next month.
Prosecutor Benjamin Aina QC said the Clarks had been married for ten years, but their relationship was turbulent and they had no children together.
He moved out of the home they shared with her grown-up sons from a previous relationship in December 2016. When he returned two months later they began sleeping in separate bedrooms and by November, Mrs Clark was telling friends that she was ‘not happy’.
Birmingham Crown Court heard that some days before the attack, Miss Bastians and her businessman father, Stephen, 58, had stayed over at the Clarks’ semi-detached home in Stoke Prior, Worcestershire.
Mr Bastians, who had been a close friend of Clark for around 20 years, told the court he and his daughter stayed that night at the Clarks’ home – with Miss Bastians said to have shared Mrs Clark’s bed in the master bedroom. He slept on the sofa.
Clark told jurors that he had heard the two women, who had been drinking, ‘giggling and talking’ from his own bedroom.
The following morning, after their guests had left, Clark claimed his wife told him that Katie had ‘started doing things to her’. Clark added: ‘I said “well surely you could stop it”?
‘She didn’t answer me, and I said to her it doesn’t matter, I just appreciate your honesty.’ He claimed Mrs Clark then asked him to promise not tell anyone what had happened.
But on New Year’s Eve, after they returned home from an evening drinking Prosecco with friends, he said they began arguing when Mrs Clark mentioned Miss Bastians and asked him if he would ‘like Katie in her sexy underwear?’.
He claimed she began talking in graphic terms about what the two women had supposedly done to each other in bed three nights earlier, ‘like she was proud of what she had done.’
The court heard that at 10.57pm, Clark sent WhatsApp messages to relatives about his wife’s supposed liaison, and also sent a text message to Mr Bastians which read: ‘Hey Steve. Don’t contact me again as Mel says your daughter started to kiss her, touch her t*** and ****** her in our bed. Good luck.’ Although the message initially failed to send, it was received by Mr Bastians’ phone at 12.04am on New Year’s Day and he saw it a few minutes later.
Asked about the message, Mr Bastians told the jury: ‘I was stunned. I think any father receiving a message like that about his daughter is going to be a bit taken aback.’
Mr Bastians added that his daughter was, and still is, in a serious same-sex relationship in Australia and planned to wed.
In between first sending Mr Bastians the text message and it being received by the businessman, Clark stabbed his wife once in the chest with a cook’s knife in her bedroom. Clark dialled 999 just before midnight, telling the operator: ‘I am sorry, I have killed my wife.’
Mr Aina said it was the prosecution’s case that Mrs Clark had told him to leave their home during the argument – and Clark killed her because he couldn’t take the rejection.
The barrister added that during his police interview, Clark had told officers about the alleged lesbian encounter.
Mr Aina also said Clark ‘had a complex’ about the size of his penis. The Clarks, both grew up in South Africa and moved to the UK in 2011.
Yesterday Miss Bastians’ mother, Janet, said Clark had invented the lesbian tryst to try to ‘save his own skin’.
‘I am sorry, I have killed my wife’