A farmer’s wife is in line for a £1.8 million divorce settlement despite facing jail for attacking her husband with a lump hammer, a court heard today.
Pamela Teasdale, 69, has been embroiled in an expensive and long-running legal battle in the civil courts over ownership of family farm buildings and terms of her divorce from husband Daniel, 74.
But the dispute has ended up in the criminal courts after Teasdale ‘attacked her husband with a lump hammer as he sat in his chair.’
The mother-of-two and grandmother was originally charged with attempted murder for the attack at the family’s farm in Todwick, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, last August.
Earlier this year the Crown accepted her guilty plea to a charge of ‘attempted wounding with intent’ and she was due to be sentenced for the ‘serious attack’ at Sheffield Crown Court today.
Pamela Teasdale, 68, is in linefor a £1.8 million divorce settlement despite facing jail for attacking her husband with a lump hammer, a court heard today
She was due to be sentence for the 'serious attack' today but the case was adjourned after Teasdale confessed to a stalking offence against her ex-husband Daniel (pictured) whilst on bail
However, the case was adjourned after it was revealed Teasdale admitted a stalking offence against her husband whilst on bail last month. She is alleged to have taken video footage of him working farm machinery after being informed he was not fit to work.
Teasdale pleaded guilty to stalking when the case came before Sheffield Magistrates.
Teasdale has been locked up since her stalking arrest and was remanded in custody by the Recorder of Sheffield Judge Jeremy Richardson, KC, today.
Meanwhile, with more legal hearings due before the civil courts the family’s wealth is ending up in the pockets of lawyers.
Judge Richardson said ‘vast sums of money have been spent’ in the legal wrangling before the family courts and that the family’s wealth has been ‘almost if not completely extinguished.’
Today Teasdale sat grim-faced in the dock watched by her two daughters who held hands in the public gallery.
The court heard a legal problem concerned with the stalking offence meant Teasdale could not be sentenced for the lump hammer attack until a future date. The offence carries a maximum life sentence.
Teasdale had been living at Burne Farm, which has been in her husband’s family for three generations, while the divorce agreement was sorted out.
But matters took a sinister turn when she ‘attacked’ Mr Teasdale last August.
Laura Marshall, prosecuting, said: ‘Mr Teasdale was sat in his chair when he was struck numerous times with a lump hammer.’
Details of any injuries suffered by the elderly farmer have not been revealed.
By then it is understood the terms of her divorce from her husband of 44 years had already been ruled on by a judge.
But the attack, with a potential for a lengthy jail sentence, added another element to the family legal dispute.
Miss Marshall said £800,000 of a £1.8m divorce settlement had now been paid to Teasdale.
There is an ongoing legal challenge over the remaining £1m.
The court heard that the family court judge has already refused two applications to stop the £1m payment and had ordered it should be paid.
Commenting on the ongoing legal battle in the civil courts, Judge Richardson said it was ‘incredibly complex’ and there was ‘a great deal of rancour on all sides.’
When the Mail first reported on the saga in March last year the legal dispute, which also involved daughter Rebecca, 46, had already cost £1m in legal fees.
At that stage the row was over ownership of a cottage worth £245,000 on the Burne Farm site.
The judge dealing with this cottage dispute said it was a ‘tragedy’ the argument was not amicably settled between them and that the ensuing long legal battle that ‘fractured’ the farming family was ‘one of the most regrettable pieces of litigation that I have ever come across.’
When the saga was first reported in March last year, the legal fees for the civil dispute dispute over ownership of family farm buildings in Todwick, South Yorkshire had already reached £1 million
Teasdale had wanted to stay at Burne Farm despite demanding a divorce and start a livery business there. Mr Teasdale wanted to pay her off with a lump sum.
What should have been a minor complication in sorting out the couple’s affairs was dealing with the ownership of Cow House, a renovated farm building at the farm where daughter Rebecca lived with husband Andrew Carter and their daughter.
Both parents were happy for Mrs Carter and her family to stay there and, as the judge was to comment later, the fact that Mr Teasdale had £2.3 million in the bank from the sale of some of his farmland to developers meant finding an agreement between them should have been ‘relatively straightforward.’
Instead a row over the ownership terms of the cottage blew up into a bitter family dispute in which Teasdale even accused her daughter of planting a listening device in her lounge to snoop on her.
Inevitably the lawyers ended up cashing-in and devouring a large chunk of the family fortune.
Teasdale ended up losing the court battle with her daughter awarded ownership of Cow House once the remaining £85,000 mortgage was paid off.
