A British woman was gardening at her father's house when she went inside and found box of graphic images of herself and another child, reports the
[ Guardian ]
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That's when she "snapped," striking him with her shovel, slitting his throat and hiding his body for 12 years in his garden.
Barbara Coombes, 63, was sentenced to nine years in prison Wednesday after she turned herself in to Greater Manchester Police and admitted to killing her 87-year-old father Kenneth in 2006 then burying his body in the backyard of his Stockport, England home, police said.
Coombes told a court that she suffered decades of sexual abuse at the hands of her father, a "violent bully" who attacked her physically and verbally, the BBC and Telegraph reported. Police confirmed she found "explicit images of a child" on the dining room table.
For 40 years, Coombes was her father's "sex slave," according to the Guardian. He raped her hundreds of times, and even into her 50s, the World War II veteran still groped her, she reportedly told psychiatrists.
Seeing the pornographic images of children created a "black cloud" inside her, the Manchester Evening News reported. She said she felt "utterly disgusted and mortified," the BBC reported. The photos triggered her memories of her lifetime of abuse.
Her father Kenneth was in the lounge when she confronted him with her spade.
In two strikes — one in the back of the head and another to slashing his throat — Coombes killed him. She then wrapped his body in a rug and brought him outside where she had been working.
A day later, Coombes bought a ton of soil to bury him in the backyard. Police said she told her family that Kenneth had died in the hospital and was cremated to explain his sudden demise.
But for 12 years, Coombes' lived in the dead man's house, collected his welfare benefits and used his money, police said. Overall, Coombes racked up 180,000 pounds, or nearly $238,000, in fraudulent benefits.
Coombes also lied about her father's whereabouts to welfare officers because she could never produce official records of his death, the Guardian reported. At one point, she claimed he was away on a Buddhist retreat when housing officers asked.
Then in January this year, a welfare officer demanded to see her father, who would have been 99, at a scheduled meeting. Coombes, knowing she had no other ways out of the visit, turned herself into police a day before the meeting.
"I murdered my father 12 years ago," Coombes told officers after she walked into a local police station, the BBC reported.
Since her arrest, Coombes has pleaded guilty to manslaughter, preventing a lawful burial and fraud.
Police said Coombes showed no remorse for killing her father through prosecutors did not deny she suffered a lifetime of sexual abuse, the Guardian reported.
"Despite having years to tell someone what really happened, she only came forward when she had no other choice," police investigator Duncan Thorpe said in a statement. "The impact on the family and friends of all concerned cannot be underestimated. As these tragic events have come to an end I hope that the family can now move forward with their lives."
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