A 23-year-old woman has been found guilty of murdering her fiance by running him over with her car when they argued after a party.
Alice Wood, 23, used her Ford Fiesta as a weapon when she hit partner Ryan Watson, 24, near the home they shared in Cheshire at 11.30pm on 6 May 2022.
The philosophy student denied murder and an alternative count of manslaughter as she claimed her boyfriend’s death was a “tragic accident”.
She told her trial she did not realise he was trapped underneath her car when she drove more than 500ft up Sandbach Road from their home in Rode Heath before stopping.
Wood showed no emotion as the jury at Chester Crown Court returned its unanimous verdict after less than eight hours of deliberation on Tuesday.
Judge Michael Leeming remanded Wood in custody and told her she “may never be released”.
He said: “You have been convicted of the murder of Ryan Watson. There is only one sentence that the law allows and that is life imprisonment.”
The judge added: “I am required to consider the minimum term you must serve in custody before the parole board deems it safe for you to be released.
“You may never be released. It is a matter entirely for the parole board.”
Wood stared downwards as she left the dock ahead of her sentencing on 29 January.
The three-week trial heard the couple, who began a relationship in March 2020 and became engaged six months later, had spent the evening at a party in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, with staff and service users of the brain injury charity Headway, where Mr Watson was a support worker.
Andrew Ford KC, prosecuting, said Mr Watson was seen on CCTV footage “having a good time, being a gregarious and outgoing party guest”, while Wood was described by one woman attending as “a bit cold”.
Fellow party guest Tiffany Ferriday told the court she and Mr Watson had “clicked” and Wood was “pretty much left out” of the conversation.
But Wood told the court when she drove Mr Watson home from the party in his car, despite knowing she was over the drink-drive limit, he “flipped” and accused her of flirting with other men.
Wood described an argument that she claimed had continued when they returned to the house they owned in Oak Street and led to Mr Watson grabbing her by her hair extensions and holding her head over the oven hob.
She said she went out to her car to leave but Mr Watson followed and they continued to argue as he stood by the car.
CCTV showed her reverse the vehicle, hitting Mr Watson’s car, a bin and a bollard.
The car could be seen in the footage reversing into Sandbach Road as Mr Watson walked away, but then swerved off the road towards him.
During his opening, prosecutor Mr Ford said “she lost her temper” and “used the car as a weapon”.
Wood told the court she had intended to “scare” Mr Watson because he had threatened her mother but planned to stop short of him and was “shocked” when she saw him on the bonnet of the car.
The CCTV showed the car reverse and then move forward, hitting Mr Watson a second time and knocking him underneath the car before driving away.
The court heard Wood was preparing for final exams in a theology, philosophy and ethics degree at the time and had since been awarded the degree based on the material she had already produced.
She had a scholarship for a part-time research masters at Cambridge, the jury was told.
On the first day of the trial, she had a copy of the book Meditations, a philosophy text by Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, under her arm as she was led in handcuffs from the prison van to the court.
In tears during much of her evidence, Wood said she had stopped the car and got out after travelling a short distance down the road because she felt it was not accelerating properly.
Wood said: “It was like stepping into a nightmare because I could see Ryan underneath the car. It was like I was in hell, It didn’t seem real.”
The court heard she then knocked on the door of a nearby house and told residents: “Please phone an ambulance. I think I’ve ran over my boyfriend.”
When police arrived and Wood was taken into custody after being arrested on suspicion of murder, she told an officer: “It’s fine, I deserve it.”
In a statement, Mr Watson’s family said it had been “so hard” to repeatedly watch the CCTV footage shown in court of the moment he was killed while trapped under the car.
They said: “The one person Ryan trusted the most is the person who took his life in such a violent way.
“Alice is in prison where she belongs but no sentence is going to be long enough for what she has taken from us and Ryan. He’ll never get to live his life and fulfil his dreams.”
Detective Inspector Nigel Parr, of Cheshire Constabulary, said: “The night Ryan died, Wood used her vehicle as a weapon while under the influence of alcohol – deliberately driving at him and even continuing to drive after knocking him down.
“She knew what she had done but since then has refused to take accountability for her actions.
“Thankfully, as a result of our investigation and the evidence against her, she has been found guilty of Ryan’s murder.”
David Jones, senior crown prosecutor at CPS Mersey-Cheshire, said: “This was a tragic loss of life of a young man with his whole life ahead of him.
“Under the influence of alcohol, it was clear that Alice Wood’s jealousy was ammunition enough for her to brutally kill her partner.”