The body of a newlywed was found stuffed inside a suitcase just four days after marrying her alleged killer, a court has heard.
Dawn Nutt, who was 52, was discovered dead inside a case in a field near the home she shared with Thomas Nutt in Lightcliffe, near Halifax, West Yorkshire, on October 31 last year .
Nutt, 45, of Shirley Grove, has admitted manslaughter but denies killing his wife.
Opening the prosecution’s case, Alistair MacDonald QC said: “It is often said that someone’s wedding day and the period immediately afterwards is one of the happiest times of their life.
“This was not the case for Dawn Nutt, née Walker, whose body was found stuffed in a suitcase and dumped in undergrowth in a field to the rear of Thomas Nutt’s house four days after she married with this accused”.
Dawn Walker. Credit: Facebook
The court heard that the last time anyone saw Dawn Nutt alive was on her wedding night.
On October 31, Thomas Nutt called police to report his wife missing and told them he had been driving around the area with his wife’s daughter, Keira-Lee, looking for her.
Mr MacDonald told the jury: “The hard, stark reality, however, is that when he made these enquiries, with Dawn’s daughter and grandson, and when he called the police to tell them she was missing, he knew full well that his body was dead in a cupboard in the matrimonial home.
“I knew she was there, in fact, because he had killed her and put her body there before stuffing it into a suitcase, breaking bones to achieve that goal before carrying her in the suitcase to a place where threw away his body. .”
Nutt later turned himself in to police and gave them the location of his wife’s body. He told them that, after the wedding, he and his new wife spent a few days in a caravan in an area near Skegness.
He said when they returned, his wife, who he said was bipolar, told him she wanted a divorce.
He claimed that she said she would have him jailed a second time, after seeing him convicted of rape and assault.
Nutt told police: “He started screaming and I hit him in the face and put my arm around his neck.”
He admitted to killing her, but said it was not intentional.
The prosecution say Nutt lied about taking his wife to Skegness.
Mr MacDonald said: “He killed her before he went to go and we say she was dead in her matrimonial home while he was away in Skegness and before that horrible farce was played out when he came back, doing to see Dawn’s daughter that her mother. was still alive and was hanging around the shops in Brighouse in an attempt to make it look like he was doing a genuine search for her before dumping her body in the field.”
The trial continues.
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