Norway: Wife killer pleads not guilty

An Iranian man charged with stabbing his wife to death outside a crisis center in Drammen last autumn pleaded not guilty when his trial started on Tuesday.

The 44-year-old man also said in court that he was certain his wife had cheated on him, and he blamed her brother for being a bad influence on her. The brother, he claimed, had become "too European," and gave the dead woman "inappropriate advice."

The 39-year-old mother of three was stabbed more than 20 times outside the Betzy Crisis Center in Drammen last year. She'd been moved there from another crisis center in Bærum, just west of Oslo, for her own protection after she left her husband, but he tracked her down.

"I asked her if she would come back home with me," her husband said. "I told her the children weren't doing well without her. She said that she would come back."

He waited for her outside the center until she emerged with a girlfriend. He's charged with stabbing her in broad daylight after he approached her, but he testified that he doesn't remember much about what happened that day last October.

He claimed he didn't stab her more than 20 times. "I don't think it was more than four or five times," he said in court.

The murder is the first outside a crisis center in Norway ever.

Source: Aftenposten (English)

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