A man convicted of murdering his wife by strangling her with a washing line has passed away while in prison.
Norman Heaton was serving a life sentence for the killing of Jacqueline Heaton, a mother of three, in South Shields, Tyneside, in May 2001. He had restrained his wife on a bed, used a washing line to strangle her, and claimed it was part of a sexual act gone awry. He then concealed her body under a staircase.
Despite Heaton’s defense that the death was accidental, a jury at Newcastle Crown Court concluded that he had deliberately strangled his wife with the intent to kill her. The couple’s relationship was strained at the time of the incident, and they had been contemplating a separation.