Former police inspector facing life jail term after being found guilty of murdering wife
A RETIRED police inspector who repeatedly cheated on his wife murdered her moments after she asked if he still loved her.
Keith Farquharson choked Alice Farquharson at the couple’s home in Aberdeen. He now faces a life sentence after he was convicted yesterday of murder following a five-day trial at the High Court in Glasgow.
He had claimed the death was “accidental”.
Farquharson will learn the minimum term he will spend behind bars when he is sentenced next month.
The killing happened about 6.30am in their bedroom last August 29 after Farquharson snapped.
Mrs Farquharson had stood by the 60-year-old despite his adultery and him once being demoted for sending a pornographic poem to a female officer.
But the 56 year-old teaching assistant had suspicions Farquharson was seeing another woman again shortly before she was killed.
The couple’s three grown-up children – chemical engineer Joanna, teacher Sarah and son Kerr who is in the RAF – were in court for the verdict.
Their father showed no emotion and refused to look at them as he was led handcuffed to the cells.
The couple had been married for 33 years – but Farquharson told jurors he had a number of affairs.
He had flings with two women in 2018. The court heard how “sexually explicit” messages had been discovered on his phone.
Farquharson previously had a relationship with another woman that ended in 2008 when Mrs Farquharson and his family found out.
But, he told the court the affair was rekindled last year after meeting her while out watching rugby in a pub.
Detectives initially treated Alice’s death as “non-suspicious”, but one officer pushed for further inquiries. The findings of a post-mortem examination eventually led to the death being treated as murder.
Farquharson will be sentenced on March 23