UK woman allegedly murdered over Facebook relationship status update

Mother of four Hayley Jones, 26, was found dead by her children on the morning of March 12th.

Her live-in partner, Brian Lewis, 31, is currently on trial for her murder. While Lewis denies murdering Jones, he did call 999 at 3:59am that day, reporting that he had killed his girlfriend. And sources say he publicly stated his intent to kill her in a local social club:

Mr Evans said this attitude contrasted with the evidence from drinkers at the Phillipstown social club on the evening of Sunday March 8, who claimed the defendant said: ‘If I can’t have her, then no ****** else will because I will kill her first.

‘Bearing in mind this Sunday was only a few days before the killing occurred.’

Mr Evans added: ‘We in the prosecution say he was not accepting of the breakdown in the relationship but he was angry about it. This is demonstrated by his comments to friends in the social club days before.’

The murder was allegedly precipitated by the young woman’s change of status on Facebook from “in a relationship” to “single” on March 2nd. Although the relationship between Jones and Lewis seemed to become strained after Lewis lost his job, Jones’ secrecy about her online social endeavors may have pushed her partner over the edge:

Mark Evans QC, prosecuting, said: “Hayley had at the same time started to expand her social horizons. She had began spending a lot of time on the internet site Facebook. Brian Lewis was to state in interview and to other people that she had been quite secretive about this.

“For example, preventing him from accessing the site and switching the computer off to prevent him from seeing any of the content. It is quite clear from the evidence, you will hear, this rankled with him.”

The defendant also admits to using a knife in the scuffle, but denies attacking his girlfriend and claimed he was using it to “cut his fingernails.”