James Clarke guilty of manslaughter following death of his father

James Clarke has been found guilty of manslaughter after stabbing his father 18 times during an attack in Heywood. Clarke, 34, was cleared of murder at a trial at Manchester Crown Court.

In April 2015, Clarke was charged with murdering his father Graham Clarke, following an attack at his uncle’s house, in which Mr Clarke was stabbed 18 times.

http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/95153/james-clarke-charged-with-the-murder-of-graham-clarke

Clarke admitted killing his father but denied murder. The jury cleared Clarke of murder after three hours and 20 minutes of deliberation.

Manchester Crown Court heard that at the time of the attack, Clarke was suffering from mental illness, which is believed to have been triggered by his mother’s death in 2010.

At the time of the attack, Graham Clarke, 52, was terminally ill with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and used an oxygen tank.

During the trial it emerged that Clarke’s childhood was ruined by neglect and abuse at the hands of his father and that his adult life was also devastated by drug related deaths including his mother and sister – all of which he blamed his father, a heroin addict, for.

Following the death of his mother, Clarke didn’t speak to his father until he found out that he was terminally ill. The pair then reconciled but the relationship quickly deteriorated when Graham Clarke began telling people that his son was a heroin addict.

Appalled by the smear against him, alongside the backdrop of his troubled childhood and the deaths of his mother and sister, Clarke went to confront his father and ended up stabbing him.

During the trial the jury heard expert evidence, supported by medical records, that Clarke was in the grip of a ‘prolonged bereavement reaction’ at the time of the attack. This is an abnormally severe response to the loss of a loved one.

Clarke is due to be sentenced on Monday 16 November.

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UPDATE
16 November

James Clarke was jailed for 13 years.