Husband Confessed to Murdering Wife at Police Station, Court Hears
A husband allegedly consumed by self-pity after his wife filed for divorce walked into a police station and calmly confessed to murdering her, jurors have heard during the opening of a murder trial at Wolverhampton Crown Court.
Calm Confession at Police Station
Harminder Mattu, 51, of Swan Crescent in Oldbury, walked into West Bromwich police station at approximately 8am on March 31, 2025, and told a female employee behind the desk that he was there to surrender. When asked why, he calmly replied "because I have murdered" and, when questioned further, stated "my wife". He directed officers to his home address where the alleged murder had taken place around 11pm the previous evening.
Prosecution's Case: Violence Escalated After Divorce Filing
Prosecutor Jonathon Barker told the court that Paramjit Kaur, 46, had filed for divorce on January 31, 2025, after years of unhappiness in their marriage. The prosecution alleges that Mattu, "absorbed by his own self-pity" and "consumed by the prospect of divorce", used violence against Ms. Kaur that escalated dramatically following the divorce filing.
"By March 30, things were fundamentally different," Mr. Barker told jurors. "Whether he was prepared to accept this or not, the reality was he had lost her and their marriage was over."
Discovery of the Body and Forensic Evidence
Police officers dispatched to the couple's Oldbury home found both the porch door and front door unlocked. They discovered Ms. Kaur's body on the floor next to a sofa, with a large black-handled kitchen knife underneath the corner of the sofa. She had dried blood around her mouth and what appeared to be a knife wound to the right side of her neck.
Forensic pathologist Dr. Alexander Kolar determined that Ms. Kaur had sustained both a stab wound and incised wounds to her neck, but concluded these injuries did not cause her death. Instead, he found evidence of petechiae (tiny red spots caused by broken capillaries) on her neck and no defensive injuries to her hands.
"Dr. Kolar's view was that the most likely sequence of events was that Ms. Kaur was initially subjected to an episode of applied neck pressure, resulting in a profoundly unconscious state before she sustained the sharp force injuries," Mr. Barker explained. "She then succumbed to the effects of the applied neck pressure - in other words, it was the pressure to the neck that caused her death."
Background of the Relationship
The court heard that Ms. Kaur, who was known as Soni, was born in Punjab, India, and moved to the UK between 2010 and 2011. The couple met in 2014 and married in Sandwell the following year. They had no children together.
Mr. Barker told jurors that Ms. Kaur had been looking for a way out of the marriage "for many years" and had initially left the marital home, only returning when Mattu allegedly made threats to take his own life.
Defendant's Account and Ongoing Trial
When speaking with a Punjabi-speaking police officer after his confession, Mattu allegedly stated that his wife had been killed, that she had compelled him to do it, and that the act had been done with a small knife after a verbal altercation during which his wife initially had the knife.
Harminder Mattu denies murdering Paramjit Kaur in March 2025. He is being assisted in court by a Punjabi interpreter as the trial continues.
