A dad who claimed he mistakenly stabbed his daughter in the heart while they were ‘mucking about’ in the kitchen has a history of serious violence, it can now be revealed.
Simon Vickers, 50, moaned to police that ‘I must be the unluckiest man in the world’ when they arrested him for knifing 14-year-old daughter Scarlett Vickers at their home in Darlington on July 5 last year.
He would go on to give several accounts of how she suffered the single fatal wound, each as far-fetched as the last.
They included throwing the knife after unwittingly picking it up with some tongs as they hurled utensils at each other for fun, and a ‘theory’ the teenager may have walked onto the blade as it stuck out over the side of the counter.
The only other person in the room at the time, Scarlett’s mum Sarah Hall, stood by Vickers but he was convicted of murder at Teesside Crown Court yesterday after experts concluded the blow could only have been struck deliberately.
Prosecutor Mark McKone KC told jurors: ‘If you accept that Mr Vickers has lied about how Scarlett was killed, this must be because he has something important to cover up.
‘This suggests that he does not have a truthful account which he considers to be innocent for you to even consider.
‘In other words, Mr Vickers has not got an innocent explanation for wounding Scarlett when the knife was held in Mr. Vickers’ hand.’
In addition to Vickers’ true motive, the jury also did not hear anything about his criminal history.
He was found guilty of wounding with intent and detained for two years in 1993, when he was 19, MailOnline reports.
In all, he has six convictions, which will likely be revealed in full when he is sentenced at the same court on February 10.
Vickers had been drinking wine, watching the Euros football tournament on television and had smoked cannabis that day.
Ms Hall was making spaghetti bolognese for the family and, when Scarlett came down from her bedroom, jurors heard they started throwing grapes at each other for fun.
The mum said Scarlett then snipped at her partner with tongs and called him ‘wimpy’ when he winced in pain.
Ms Hall said she turned away to serve the meal and then heard Scarlett say ‘ow’.
When she turned back around, she immediately saw that their only child was pouring with blood.
Ms Hall made a 999 call and told the operator they had been ‘messing about’ and that her partner had thrown something at their daughter ‘and he didn’t realise’.
Vickers told paramedic Andrew Crow that his daughter had lunged towards him during a bout of play-fighting.
In his prosecution opening speech to the jury, Mr McKone said: ‘Mr Crow said that initially the defendant and Scarlett’s mum said they were unsure how the injury occurred and then Scarlett’s mum said that Scarlett and her dad were play-fighting and “chucking” knives at each other.
‘Mr Crow said that the defendant picked up a knife off the side counter of the kitchen and said, “We were messing on, we were play-fighting and she lunged towards me and it just went in”.’
Scarlett died at the scene.
Giving evidence in his defence, Vickers insisted it had been a ‘freak accident’.
He claimed he had swiped what he thought were tongs along a work surface, into her chest, and never realised it was a knife.
Following the conviction, Anna Barker, senior crown prosecutor with CPS North East, said: ‘The account provided by Simon Vickers about how his daughter, Scarlett, sustained a fatal injury is wholly inconsistent with the forensic evidence in this case.
‘As part of our case against him, the Crown Prosecution Service instructed a medical expert, whose analysis made it clear that the nature of the wound sustained by Scarlett could only have been caused if the knife used had been firmly gripped as she was injured.’
Durham Police Detective Superintendent Craig Rudd said: ‘Scarlett Vickers would have celebrated her 16th birthday this year.
‘She had her whole life ahead of her. Yet it was cruelly cut short by her own father – a man who was meant to protect her.
‘We may never know why or what caused Simon Vickers to do what he did that night.’
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