Man admits stabbing exwife’s flatmate

AT 4.30am on February 7 last year, Daryen Leslie John Owens told his flatmate: ‘‘I’m going to do something stupid’’.

Just over an hour later, his exwife’s flatmate was lying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor of her South Dunedin home.

Owens had stabbed her 14 times. Medical staff at Dunedin Hospital said she was lucky to survive.

Owens appeared before the High Court at Dunedin yesterday, just days before his jury trial was set to begin.

He admitted the charge of attempted murder and was remanded in custody until sentencing next month.

Now, nearly a year since the incident, the details of the vicious attack can be revealed.

Owens had a grudge against the victim and had previously told a friend the woman was ‘‘going to get it’’ and ‘‘she better watch out’’.

At 5.38am, the defendant received a text message from his exwife saying: ‘‘is that you at my door?’’

It was him.

The pair spoke briefly on the phone during which Owens told her the victim, who was asleep on the couch at the time, was ‘‘going to get a ****** lesson that she would never forget’’.

Moments later, the exwife woke her friend and said there was someone at the door.

She hid in the kitchen while the victim went to see who it was.

Owens grabbed her by the throat, pushed her into a wall, headbutted her and stabbed her in the shoulder.

The 13 wounds that followed lacerated the woman’s liver, punctured her lung, penetrated the muscles beside her spine and one to her abdomen resulted in her stomach lining protruding from her skin.

As the victim bled, Owens warned his exwife not to call emergency services.

‘‘You know she is dead don’t you?’’ he said.

‘‘Don’t call the cops; you know where your loyalties lie.’’

His exwife described how her former partner’s eyes looked ‘‘possessed’’ when he confronted her.

The summary of facts outlined what followed but there was no reason stated as to why Owens wanted to kill the woman. When the defendant arrived at a friend’s house minutes later, he had blood on his face and used the bathroom to clean himself up.

On leaving he said he had ‘‘finished the victim off’’.

In the days following the frenzied attack, Owens met his exwife at St Clair Beach where he told her he had stashed the 8.5cm blade he used to attack the victim at a Fox St address.

He had done so to ‘‘set up’’ a woman, he said.

But the police were not fooled. An examination of the crime scene found a bloody finger and palm print on an exterior door, which matched the defendant’s.

The bathroom where he washed the victim’s blood from his face also tested positive for blood.

A search of Owens’ home at Fingall St revealed a stainless steel kitchen knife and its storage block missing, too.

When interviewed, he denied any involvement in the bloody attack but yesterday that changed.

Owens was given a firststrike warning on entering his guilty plea and faces a maximum penalty of 14 years’ imprisonment at sentencing.