Woman jailed for running over unfaithful husband

A woman who ran over her unfaithful husband in a hotel car park was convicted of first-degree murder yesterday despite eliciting sympathy from the court and even from the hard-nosed Houston district attorney's office.

After 48 hours of deliberations, the jury found that Clara Harris had known exactly what she was doing when she slammed her foot on the accelerator of her Mercedes and hurtled straight into her husband at the Nassau Bay Hilton, Houston.

David Harris was at the hotel to meet his mistress, a receptionist at his dental practice and had just got out of her car when he was hit.

The case offered an insight into the the implacable workings of the toughest criminal justice system in the United States. During the trial, Mr Harris was depicted as a manipulative, abusive, unfaithful skunk who flirted so outrageously with his receptionist that some of his employees became physically ill.

"You can't help but feel sympathy, but you know the solution is to get a divorce," the prosecutor, Mia Magness, said in her closing statement to a jury of nine women and three men. "She should do like every other woman in Harris County and take him to the cleaners. Get his house, car kids, make him wish he were dead. But you don't get to kill him."

Mrs Harris' lawyers argued the killing was an accident, that the door of the four-wheel-drive had obscured her view of her husband, that she loved him too deeply to want him dead. The most damaging testimony against her came from her 17-year-old stepdaughter who was in the car with her. Lyndsey Harris said her stepmother flew into a rage and said she wanted to "hit" her husband moments before she did it.

Mrs Harris faces life imprisonment, but lawyers intend to argue for mitigation on the ground of "sudden passion" at her sentencing hearing. If they prevail, she could spend two years behind bars.