Woman accused of love rival’s murder ‘was swapping saucy pictures with victim’s partner’
'Obsessed' Sarah Williams was sexting victim's boyfriend, court hears
A JILTED woman was swapping "saucy" photographs and sexual texts with the partner of the love rival she is accused of murdering, a court has heard.
Sarah Williams, 35, is accused of brutally stabbing mother-of-two Sadie Hartley, 60, after stunning her with a cattle-prod over a love tussle with her ex-boyfriend Ian Johnston.
Pals of Williams today told Preston Crown Court how she was still “obsessed” with Mr Johnston after their relationship ended and the pair traded explicit messages.
They claimed she even had a set of keys cut for his house and entered the property without him knowing so she could wait naked on his bed for him to come home.
Natalie Chapman, a work colleague of Williams, said she told her she “wasn't going to wash” after Mr Johnson touched her arm in a pub car park.
Williams and her friend Katrina Walsh, 56, are accused of stabbing Ms Hartley 40 times in an “orgy of violence” on the doorstep of her £500,000 home in Helmshore, Lancashire.
The attack was carried out with "demonic savagery" according to prosecutors.
Miss Chapman also recounted how Williams told her she was “'smiling like someone who's mentally ill” after she saw a picture of Mr Johnston wearing a top she had bought him.
She also said Williams was once turned away at the door after visiting Mr Johnston at home.
Miss Chapman added: “She barged past him, sat on the sofa and started to cry.”
Earlier this morning, the court heard from Richard Savery who worked alongside Williams at the Chill Factore ski centre in Manchester.
He said he overheard Williams “threatening to kill” her new boyfriend, David Hardwick.
Mr Savery told the court: “I would normally interpret that as a light hearted comment however she was with David at the time and he said 'don't say things like that people might believe them.'
“It was his reaction that shocked me.
“It was as if he believed she might carry it through.”
Another witness Naomi Cowley, who worked at Crystal Ski Holidays based in the Chill Factore building, told the court how Williams brought a new dress to "impress" Mr Johnston at a funeral they were both attending.
The co-defendants sat apart in court, both making notes.
Williams dressed in a bight pink top underneath a suit jacket and trousers, while Walsh had a bandana covering her head.
Yesterday the court heard how Williams wrote a “spiteful” letter to her love rival telling her she had been having “unbelievably fantastic sex” with her boyfriend.
Williams is said to have planned the murder with best pal Walsh in a plot described as “the stuff of spy novels”.
Prosecutors claim entries in Walsh's diary prove they meticulously planned the murder.
In September 2014 she wrote: “Sarah came round. Got caught up in endless murder plots for Ian’s other half.
A year later she confessed: “Wow, I may get to be instrumental in helping remove the awful woman! This may happen. Wow!
"Am unexpectedly excited by it.”
The pair are alleged to have plotted to frame ISIS for the killing by planting Islamic State flags at the crime scene.
They deny murder.
The case continues.
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