Thomas Nutt on trial for the alleged murder of Dawn Walker

Thomas Nutt had left Dawn Walker’s dead body in a cupboard and gone to Skegness before acting out the ‘ghastly charade’ of looking for her saying she had disappeared, it is alleged.

Nutt, 45, denies murdering Miss Walker but has admitted manslaughter, the jury was told.

Dawn Walker

Alistair MacDonald QC, for the Crown, said: “It is often said that someone’s wedding day and the immediate period after that is one of the happiest times of their life.

“That was not the case with Dawn Nutt, nee Walker, whose body was found stuffed into a suitcase and dumped into some undergrowth in a field towards the back of Thomas Nutt’s house four days after she was married to this defendant.

“The wedding had taken place on October 27, 2021, and the discovery of the body in the suitcase was made on October 31.

“The last known sighting of her alive was in fact made by her maid of honour and that sighting was between 10.30 and 11pm on her wedding night.”

Forensic officers and police investigating following Dawn Walker's death

Mr MacDonald said Nutt phoned the police to report his new wife missing on October 31 saying she had left to visit her daughter in Brighouse and hadn’t turned up there.

The police went to his home in Shirley Grove, Lightcliffe, to take missing person’s report.

He was ‘for all the world like a distraught husband of a new wife who had apparently disappeared without trace,’ Mr MacDonald said.

But Nutt knew perfectly well that her body was in a cupboard at the marital home because he had killed her and put it there before stuffing it into a suitcase, breaking bones in order to achieve that objective, and wheeling her to a place at which he dumped her body, it is alleged.

Later that day he handed himself in at Halifax Police Station and was arrested for murder.

Police at the scene following Dawn Walker's death

He stated that Miss Walker had got bipolar and was depressed. Two days after the wedding she told him she wanted a divorce. She started screaming and he hit her in the face and put his arm round her neck.

Mr MacDonald said that Miss Walker never went to Skegness. She lay dead in the matrimonial home while he was away and before the ‘ghastly charade’ was acted out when he looked round the shops in Brighouse for her.

Shane Barkham, a neighbour, said the couple’s relationship was troubled. He heard regular arguments between them. He had never observed Nutt being violent but he appeared possessive and controlling.

Before the wedding, Nutt told him he was taking Miss Walker to a layby outside Skegness in a caravan for their honeymoon.

The jury was shown CCTV footage of the couple’s wedding day. Miss Walker wore a bright red bridal gown for the ceremony at the Register Office in Brighouse on the afternoon of October 27. The celebration continued at the town’s Prince Albert pub.

Witnesses described the pub celebration, with about 20 people present, as a happy event with Miss Walker in good spirits.

The couple left by taxi at about 10.20pm with ‘kisses all round after a very pleasant event.’

The court heard that Nutt then said Miss Walker was with him at the caravan near Skegness.

He sent picture messages to Mr Barkham of the wedding day and said they would be back for Halloween.

On October 31, Nutt reported Miss Walker missing while knowing she was dead, Mr MacDonald said.

CCTV played in court showed Nutt dragging the wheeled suitcase containing her body down his garden, carrying it over the fence and going down a footpath, pulling the case with him, and dumping it in bushes.

On his way back he met a police officer dealing with the missing person report. He knocked on the door and messaged Nutt to ‘start the ball rolling’ for the search for Miss Walker.

The jury heard the officer noticed that Nutt was sweating and had a wet stain on one knee where he had knelt to deposit the case.

Mr MacDonald said Nutt was making ‘a determined effort to get away with killing his wife.’

A woman then opened the zip of the case a few inches and was shocked to see the contents. The police were called and found the case hidden under a tree with Miss Walker’s body in it. She was half-naked and appeared to have been folded in half.

The post-mortem examination revealed that she had suffered significant neck injuries. There had been a forceful application of pressure.

She had deep bruising to both sides of her head, a left black eye with lacerations, deep bruising to her jaw and a fractured nasal bone and eye socket.

In addition to these injuries there were fractures of the left tibia and fibula and four broken ribs probably caused after death in order to get her body into the suitcase.

The trial continues at 10.30am tomorrow.