Often omitted from most presentations of this case is Emma Humphreys’ own incidents of violence and difficult behaviour, at least before her killing of Armitage and subsequent conviction.

The Guardian released some of Humphreys’ diary entries in this article and argued that, if they were published at the time of Humphreys’ initial conviction, they could have lessened her sentence. Ironically, in my opinion, the diaries could have equally SUPPORTED her conviction.

One entry comes from her time in Canada. Both Emma’s mother and stepfather seemed to have been heavy drinkers which clearly made her home life unstable. According to her own account, Emma had ran away from home on at least one occasion and ended up spending time in a children’s home called Westfield in Edmonton where she records that she cut herself and, in one incident, “went rank” (whatever that means) on her social worker which resulted in her being restrained by security guards.

She also describes her relationship with her mother. Humphreys records her mother “drinking 24 hours a day” and writes that “she upsets me” (this is admittedly open to interpretation: is Emma being sympathetic towards her mother or saying that her mother says/does things to her which she doesn’t like?) Later she writes that she “never had a mother-to-daughter relationship” with her mother.

When she was living with her ‘Nana’ (grandmother) back in the UK in Nottingham she writes that she and her Nana “aren’t talking again” because her Nana was “being so judgmental towards me”. This suggests that Humphreys’ behaviour was concerning enough to warrant criticism from her grandmother and probably the reason for Humphrey not staying with her.

Other entries after she moved in with Armitage describe him hitting Humphreys, her getting involved with another man called Anthony, and the two of them smashing up Armitage’s house which led to them ending up “at Radford Road cells.”

The (biased) Wikipedia article on Humphreys mentions that she had convictions before her murder case:

“In January 1985, Humphreys was arrested and kept on remand at HM Prison Risley for two incidents, one of which involved assaulting a hotel manager.”

In her diary, Emma writes that she had assaulted a police officer as well as the hotel manager! The Court of Appeal judgement simply refers to Emma appearing before the criminal court “as a result of two incidents” conveniently not mentioning any assault on her part. There is however an interesting detail here that Humphreys was conditionally discharged on 21^st February 1985 – only a few days before she killed Trevor Armitage – who had “took in another girl” while “she was away”.

Did Armitage taking in another woman while Humphreys was on remand contribute to Humphreys’ actions days later? It may have certainly infuriated her and made her jealous – although this is simply a conjecture on my part. Killing someone only days after being conditionally released isn’t exactly going to help you avoid going to prison though.

What is evident here is that, even before her association with Armitage, Emma Humphreys was capable of impulsive and destructive actions like the one that led to her imprisonment.

True, Emma Humphrey’s erratic behaviour would have likely made her vulnerable to dangerous and predatory men but she was obviously just as capable of being violent and unpredictable.

According to her Wikipedia article, a psychiatrist at the original 1985 trial described Humphreys as:

“of abnormal mentality, with immature, explosive and attention-seeking traits, the last trait referring to her tendency to slash her wrists”

A medical examination after her killing of Armitage also revealed cuts all over her arms including recent ones. According to Emma herself, Armitage had taunted her about her wrist-slashing which was what led to her stabbing him. Was this evidence of persistent mental abuse by Armitage towards Humphreys which caused her to finally snap and retaliate? Or evidence of the couple’s destructive characters and relationship? Feminists would have us believe that the former was the case. This interpretation of the events is a classic example of so-called ‘battered women’s syndrome’ which argues that pre-meditated or seemingly unprovoked acts of violence by women against their male partners is the result of the men’s previous abuse of the women. Obviously, acts of violence from one person to another will, in many cases, result with a response in kind but if that response leads to murder, then the murder victim is still a victim.

Had Trevor Armitage forced himself on Emma Humphreys and tried to rape, injure or murder her, then her stabbing of him could be justified as an act of manslaughter – which makes the idea of battered women syndrome futile.