Gun dealer who shot wife feared he had virus

A gun dealer who shot dead his solicitor wife during the first national coronavirus lockdown believed he was infected with Covid-19 and had contacted care providers 26 times in 42 days, a court heard.

Peter Hartshorne-jones, 52, shot his 42-year-old wife, Silke, twice at close range with a double-barrelled shotgun at their Suffolk home on May 3 last year, Ipswich Crown Court heard.

Peter Gair, prosecuting, said Mrs Hartshorne-jones told a neighbour in the days before her death that “her husband was not good at all”.

The defendant pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to manslaughter by diminished responsibility.