For those not based in the UK, the British media has been consumed with the case of Penelope Jackson, a 66 year old woman recently convicted of murder for stabbing her husband, David Jackson, to death earlier this year.

Despite the guilty verdict, returned as it happens by a jury two thirds of whom were women, the vast majority of the media coverage has sought to deflect blame from Mrs Jackson by painting her late husband as a violent abuser and depicting her actions as a necessary evil.

Testimony in the trial from none other than Mrs Jackson's own daughter revealed that although David Jackson was violent, the last incident of violence on his part occured in 1998, more than 20 years ago. It was also revealed that Penelope Jackson enjoyed "baiting people for fun" and liked to make her husband "uncomfortable", indicating that she herself may have engaged in abusive behaviour. During a call to the emergency services immediately after the stabbing, Mrs Jackson told operators that her husband was "bleeding to death with any luck" and upon being informed that she was to be charged with murder, replied "good". It is surely no coincidence that the third husband of Penelope Jackson took his own life.

It is simply beyond credulity that a man in a similar position, convicted of murdering his wife, could expect such sympathetic media coverage in the aftermath. The coverage is indicative of tendancies to deflect blame onto the male when wrongdoing on the part of a woman is uncovered in a relationship. It is well known that female on male domestic abuse is widespread and yet, even following the death of a man in what was almost certainly an abusive relationship, the media cannot bear to hold the female perpetrator to account. The blame often heaped upon men who report abuse from a female partner surely contributes to the reluctance among men to report domestic violence. Penelope Jackson is clearly an abusive and chaotic individual and was rightly convicted of murder last week. The majority female jury saw through her sharad, so why can't the media?

What do others think about this?

Edited to clear up confusion between references to the offender and victim, both of whom are named Jackson.