{"id":644682,"date":"2026-06-18T04:27:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T04:27:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/644682\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T04:27:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T04:27:20","slug":"ashington-man-convicted-of-manslaughter-after-killing-his-terminally-ill-wife-dies-in-cyprus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/644682\/","title":{"rendered":"Ashington man convicted of manslaughter after killing his terminally ill wife dies in Cyprus"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Hunter was found guilty of manslaughter in 2023 after he suffocated wife Janice<\/p>\n

19:22, 17 Jun 2026Updated 19:32, 17 Jun 2026<\/p>\n

\"David<\/p>\n

David Hunter was found guilty of the manslaughter of his wife Janice in Cyprus(Image: Albanpix.com)<\/p>\n

A Northumberland<\/a> man who who killed his terminally ill wife has today died in hospital, his family has said. David Hunter, 78, was found guilty of manslaughter in 2023 after he suffocated wife Janice, 74, at their home in Cyprus in December 2021.<\/p>\n

The 78-year-old’s trial heard how she had been suffering terminal blood cancer and had ‘begged him for weeks\u2019 to end her life. Mirror Online reports<\/a> how his heartbroken daughter Lesley Cawthorne, 53, today confirmed that her father had died in a Cypriot hospital.<\/p>\n

\"David<\/p>\n

David Hunter was jailed for the manslaughter of his terminally-ill wife(Image: PA)<\/p>\n

The former coal miner from Ashington<\/a> had been suffering increasingly poor health since being released from prison three years ago. He is understood to have been admitted to hospital this week because of a urinary tract infection, but today died suddenly.<\/p>\n

Lesley, from Norwich, said today: “We are devastated and the support over the last few years has meant the world to us.”<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The 76-year-old has remained in Cyprus following his release to stay near his wife’s grave(Image: Humphrey Nemar)<\/p>\n

David and Janice had been married for 52 years and retired to Cyprus in 2002. After Janice\u2019s death he was jailed for two years, but with time served, was released in the summer of 2023.<\/p>\n

He remained living on the island to be close to his late wife’s grave near Tremithousa. Cyprus’ attorney general appealed both the manslaughter verdict and the sentencing handed down to Hunter, and further court hearings were due.<\/p>\n

His trial in Paphos heard that after suffocating Janice, Hunter had tried to take his own life but was found by police officers who were alerted by Interpol after he had contacted family to tell them what had happened.<\/p>\n

The case made headlines around the world as debates broke out over the mercy killing.<\/p>\n

Our Northumberland Live newsletter is free. You can sign up to receive it here<\/a>. It will keep you up to date with all the latest breaking news and top stories from in and around Northumberland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Hunter was found guilty of manslaughter in 2023 after he suffocated wife Janice 19:22, 17 Jun 2026Updated…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":644683,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[7171,59,57,58,50,2680,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-644682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-ashington","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-northumberland","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}