A FORMER partner of a murder accused has told a court how he was violent towards her and once spent all their money on slot-machines.

Caroline Wardell said Graham Gibson – the father of three of her 12 children – was a moody gambler who was strict with the kids at home.

She told a jury at Teesside Crown Court that Gibson had attacked her a number of times during their five-year relationship in the 1990s.

The former factory worker is accused of murdering his most recent partner Christine Henderson at a house in Middlesbrough in July this year.

The prosecution claims Gibson had been violent towards Mrs Henderson, 50, in the past and had stolen from her to feed his gambling habit.

A week before the “brutal and sustained” knife killing, the mother-of-three left the couple's home in Hartlepool and moved in with a friend.

Gibson, 47, tracked her down after bombarding her with phone calls, texts and Facebook messages, and Mrs Henderson agreed to meet.

At the house in Cherwell Terrace, on the Brambles Farm estate, she was knifed 12 times – 11 times in the head, chest and neck – and died.

Divorcee Gibson, of Kent Avenue, Hartlepool, denies murder. He claims he was provoked by Mrs Henderson and lost his self-control.

Prosecutor Jamie Hill, QC, described the defence as “weak” and told the jury that Gibson stabbed Mrs Henderson to death “in a rage”.

The jury today (Tuesday, October 16) heard from one of Mrs Henderson's daughters who said both she and her mother were assaulted by Gibson last year.

Nicole Henderson, 19, said she saw Gibson pin down her mother while the couple were arguing at their home in Hartlepool in December.

The teenager said she tried to calm him down after he smashed a mobile phone to stop his partner ringing the police to report him.

“He shouted in my face ‘This has nothing to do with you’,” she told the jury. “He grabbed and chucked me across the back yard.”

Police investigated the assaults, but the case was dropped when Ms Henderson got back with Gibson, and convinced her daughter to agree.

Ms Wardell said he had once punched her in the head, once thumped her in the nose and also picked her up and threw her to the ground.

Asked today by defence QC Maura McGowan “He wasn't violent towards you, was he?”, she replied: “Not all the time, but he could be.”