David Barraclough was jailed for life with a minimum term of 22 years and one month after admitting he murdered Carolann Barraclough and hid her body in a freezer. He changed his plea to guilty on the first day of trial, bringing the case to a close at Leeds Crown Court.
Leeds Crown Court sentence
The court heard that Carolann Barraclough was killed with a hammer at the family home in Horbury, near Wakefield, sometime between 19 and 21 February. She was a mother of three, and after her death he tied up her body and placed it in a freezer in the utility room of the home they shared.
David Barraclough then spent about two weeks trying to conceal what he had done. He told relatives and friends that she was in hospital and that only he was able to visit her, while also using her phone to send messages suggesting she would soon return home.
Normanton Police Station confession
On 5 March, he walked into Normanton Police Station and told a receptionist, “I’ve killed my wife.” Officers who went to the family home found Carolann Barraclough’s body inside the freezer. The Crown Prosecution Service said he had kept up his daily life after the killing, including visits to pubs, withdrawals of large sums of cash from a joint bank account and downloading Tinder two days after her death.
Jill May of CPS Yorkshire and Humberside said Barraclough had “brutally murder[ed] Carolann” and “hid her body in the home she shared with her children and lied repeatedly to her friends and family as he spun a calculated web of lies, pretending she was alive and recovering from illness in hospital.” She also praised Carolann Barraclough’s eldest daughter for her “incredible bravery” in providing evidence.
CCTV and self-defence claim
Barraclough later said he had acted in self-defence after being struck with a hammer and described himself as “heartbroken,” “in a haze” and “confused.” Prosecutors said CCTV footage showed no visible injuries and rejected that account.
The guilty plea and sentence resolved a case built around the killing, the concealment of the body and the false messages sent to family and friends. The sentence leaves Barraclough serving life in prison with a minimum term of 22 years and one month.
