Category: Female Killers

I would like to point out now that I’m writing this while listening to the sound of sizzling meat in a skillet. I promise it’s chicken and not long pork.

The woman who served the other-other white meat was Australia’s, Katherine Knight. Knight now has the distinction of being the first woman in Australia sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Like many killers, Katherine had a troubled and violent upbringing. She was abused by both of her parents and claimed to have been sexually assaulted by Her mother would often discuss the details of her sex life with her daughter and told her about how much she hated men.

When Katherine started high school she became a loner and a bully. The only people she was close to were her twin sister and her uncle, Oscar Knight. When he committed suicide in 1969 when Katherine was only 17, she became very distraught.

During high school, Katharine assaulted a male classmate and attacked a teacher. She was also known to fly into terrifying rages. When she wasn’t assaulting educators and other classmates, Katherine was a model student although she claimed that she never learned to read and write.

She dropped out of high school at age 15 and started working in a clothing factory. A year later, Knight started working at what she called her “dream job” at a slaughterhouse. She was promoted and given her very own set of butcher knives! Unlike presumably all other slaughterhouse employees, she took these knives home and hung them over her bed so “they would always be handy if I needed them.” Knight continued sleeping with the knives above her bed until her arrest.

Katherine found her first love and husband, David Kallett. When they married in 1974 Knight’s own mother told him: “You better watch this one or she’ll fucking kill you.” I doubt that’s on too many Hallmark cards.

His mother-in-law’s theory luckily didn’t come to pass (at least not for him) but his new life tried to strangle him on their wedding night. Katherine later recalled this was because he would only have sex with her a measly three times and fell asleep.

Unsurprisingly, their marriage didn’t last long. On one occasion, when Knight was pregnant with their daughter, Melissa Ann, she hit him in the head with a frying pan and fractured his skull. Soon after Melissa Ann was born, Kallett left him for another woman.

The day after he left her, Knight was seen throwing a baby stroller back and forth down the street. She was admitted to a mental health facility and treated for postpartum depression. Knight stayed in the hospital for several weeks and was quickly readmitted after she dumped her daughter on a train, stole an ax, and threaten to kill several people. Melissa Ann was rescued shortly before the train departed.

Kallett and Knight reconciled and had another daughter in 1980 before breaking up in 1984. Two years later Knight met another man, David Saunders. They also had a violent and volatile relationship.

On another occasion, Knight slit the throat of a baby dingo in front of Saunders and said she’d do the same to him if she ever caught him cheating on her. She would also frequently throw him out of her apartment. When she became pregnant with their daughter, Saunders bought a house which Knight decorated with animals skins, skulls, horns, rusty traps, old boots, leather, and machetes.

Knight also hit him in the face with an iron and stabbed him in the stomach with a pair of scissors. She also cut up all of his clothes. Saunders left her and when into hiding. He returned several months later to see their daughter. This prompted Knight to go to the police where she claimed he was the violent one. She was issued an Apprehended Violence Order against him (similar to an Emergency Protective Order in the U.S.).

Knight had another relationship with a man named John Chillingworth. The two had a son named Eric. After three years, Knight left him for John Price.

Knight and Price had been having an affair for some time while he was married and she was still with Chillingworth. Price had three children with his ex-wife, two of which lives with him. Price was well aware of Knight’s violent history but continued their relationship and let her move into his house.

They soon had a fight brought on by Price’s refusal to marry her. Knight then made a video of several items Price had stolen from his work. Knight took the video to his boss and he was fired.

A few months later, Price rekindled their relationship but didn’t allow her to move back into his house. After their relationship started again, the ill-fated lovers started fighting even more. Price’s friends said they would no longer have anything to do with him if he continued seeing Knight. Price was well liked in their small community and many were shocked when he became romantically involved with Knight.

Their relationship finally came to a head in February 2000 when Knight stabbed him in the chest. On February 29, Knight obtained a restraining order against her. Later that day, Price told his co-workers that if he didn’t come to work the next day it was because Knight had killed him. He also feared she would kill his children as well.

After work on the night of February 29, Price went over to his neighbor’s house and drank for several hours. When he returned home, he found Knight there. The couple had sex and Price soon fell asleep. He would never wake up.

The next morning, his neighbors called the police when they noticed his car still in the driveway. The police were called and arrived at 8:00 a.m. There they found a gruesome sight.

Warning: this is graphic.

Knight was found unconscious after taking a bottle of pills. Evidence showed that Knight stabbed Price 37 times while he was sleeping and that he tried to get away and bled out in the hallway where he died. What was left of Price’s body was found posed with his arm wrapped around a 2-liter bottle. She then skinned him and hung his skin on a meat hook in the living room. Price was decapitated and his head was found in a pot still hot on the stove. Knight cooked other parts of his body with baked potato, pumpkin, beetroot, courgette, cabbage, yellow squash, and gravy.

The police found two place settings at the dining room table with place cards with the names of Price’s children. Another meal and some of the cooked human meat were found discarded in the backyard. Police believed that Knight might have attempted to eat it. Price’s body also had a note attached to it which read: “Time got you back Johathon for rapping [raping] my douter [daughter]. You to Beck [Price’s daughter] for Ross – for Little John [his son]. Now play with little Johns dick John Price.”

When Knight woke up from her pill-induced coma, she claimed to have no memory of committing the crime. The accusation that Price had raped Knight’s daughter was never proven.

Knight was arrested and attempted to plead guilty to manslaughter. Her plea was rejected and changed to not guilty of the murder or Price. Her lawyers attempted to use a plea of amnesia and insanity. Several psychiatrists diagnosed Knight with borderline personality disorder and was declared fit to stand trial.

Before the trial began, the judge offered selected jury members to be excused due to the graphic crime scene photos. Knight was obviously found guilty and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Knight has continually refused to believe that she killed Price and still claims she doesn’t remember killing, dismembering, and cooking him.

In 2006, Knight attempted to appeal her life sentence and failed. Knight is currently serving her sentence in the Silverwater Women’s Correctional Centre in New South Wales.