All the warning signs that showed mum, 47, would murder 24-year-old boyfriend

09 October 2023 , 14:19

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Natalie Bennett was convicted of the murder of her boyrfriend Kasey Anderson (Image: Liverpool echo)

The family of a man who was stabbed in the heart by his killer girlfriend has revealed the history of domestic violence in the relationship and said he would come home "sobbing" and looking like the "elephant man."

Kasey Anderson, 24, was knifed in the chest and slashed multiple times by his partner Natalie Bennett, 47, outside of her home in Croxteth, Liverpool on March 11. When officers arrived at the scene, the mum-of-four said he turned up at her home just "like that."

However, harrowing footage from her neighbour's Ring doorbell showed Mr Anderson clutching his chest and collapsing on the floor as he phoned medics to tell them he was "dying." Mr Anderson was taken to Aintree Hospital and underwent emergency surgery but he passed away 20 days later, just a week before his 25th birthday.

Mr Anderson's mum, dad and aunt recalled how he would often return home with "a few black eyes" before the last incident turned fatal. Jurors at the trial at Liverpool Crown Court heard frightening accounts from his family as they stood strong in the witness box. His aunt Denise Anderson described Bennett as a "manipulator and a groomer".

Kasey Anderson tragically died before his 25th birthday (Liverpool Echo)

Ms Anderson recalled how during lockdown 2020, she was "busy upstairs, cleaning" when Kasey was living with her and Bennett rang the doorbell, reports Liverpool Echo. She said: "I could hear shouting from Ms Bennett. There wasn’t a raised voice from him. She walked away. She come back, I was halfway down the stairs. She drew her head back, I thought she was gonna headbutt him. She just spat all over his face, so I run out. I moved him out the way, actually pushed him out the way. I said 'keep away from my lad, keep away from my house'."

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Ms Anderson said she had seen her nephew with injuries on "maybe seven or eight" occasions around this time. She added: "He never come out with a straight answer, he’d go to me and my mum 'I’m a lover, not a fighter'." The aunt was asked about an incident in February 2022 when Mr Anderson arrived home at around 7am. She tearfully said on the stand: "He normally comes into my room, 'are you awake?'. I was already up in the room. He went into his room and shut the door.Then I heard him sobbing. Really, really, really sobbing.

"I go in. He couldn’t lift his face up. When I seen his face, he’d been absolutely battered. His eyes. His face looked like the Elephant Man. Two of his eyes were up. One of them was closing as I was looking at him. His neck had scratches all down him. His t-shirt was ripped. His mouth was a little bit swollen this side, his right hand side. His face was swollen. As I was trying to tend to him, he was sobbing. I went to get a cloth to try and get the swelling down. I asked him who done it. I was crying. I was asking what happened, 'who’s done this?'. He wouldn’t answer me. He just couldn’t. He was uncontrollably crying."

The incident took place on Carr Lane East in Croxteth on March 11 (Liverpool Echo)

Ms Anderson said there was a "big bang" on her porch door with a "brick" mark on her window. She continued: "As I come down the ramp, there was a taxi. Someone hurriedly hunched to get in. I shouted 'you little rat', because I thought it was a kid. Natalie Bennett turned around, there was a lot of swearing at me. I said 'what have you been doing?'. 'What have you done to him?'." Bennett reportedly replied: "I never done it, it wasn’t me. I’ve never done it."

By now, Mr Anderson had left his bedroom and gone outside. Ms Anderson said: "He was asking me to go in, 'leave it, go in', but I couldn’t. She’d done that to a kid. How can you do that to a kid? She was going out the gate and she dragged me by my head. She kept pulling my head down. She’s on one side of the gate, I’m on this side. Kasey came out. I said 'don’t touch her, I’ll do it'. I don’t know where I got it from, but I brought my fist and hit her there and she let go."

Dad Graham Anderson meanwhile described their relationship as "toxic", saying on the stand: "They’d be alright before they’d start drinking. As the day went on with the drink, they would get vicious and be arguing with each other. I never seen Kasey lift his hand to her. She was always physical with him, punch him. Most weeks I’d see Kasey with a black eye, a fat lip, scratches all over him. Every time I’d see him he’d have different marks all over him. He’d always make up something, I bumped into a door or fell over. I knew what had happened." His mum Lesley Topen meanwhile was asked to describe her son's relationship with Bennett, and said they "seemed alright" at first but that after "a few months" he began to have "marks on his face and body".

Ms Topen said she had not seen her assault Kasey, but added: "He said it was Natalie. He told me on a number of occasions that Natalie had done it." She reported that he had said this had happened "easily 20 times", and said of one incident after he "came home quite late in the evening" in February this year. "He had a stab wound to the head," she recalled. "He sat down, he had a can of Stella. He said 'mum, she stabbed me in the head'. Ms Topen indicated that he had a bleeding wound measuring around an inch in length and added: "He was very solemn, very sad. He was tipsy, but he wasn’t drunk. I asked to take him to hospital. He said 'no, I’m not going'."

Bennett was convicted of murder at a trial at Liverpool Crown Court last week. She will be sentenced on November 10. Judge Denis Watson KC told her: "You have been convicted of murder, for which there can only be one sentence - imprisonment for life. It is possible there may be some medical information that may touch on the minimum term I must assess before you can be considered for release. This is a sentence where there can be that only one sentence, which is imprisonment for life."

Monica Charsley