A WOMAN who stabbed her drunken lover through the heart has had her murder conviction overturned by Appeal Court judges.

Mother-of-three Jean Naylor was instead ruled guilty of manslaughter and had her life sentence replaced by a six-year term after top judges accepted the judge at her trial had misdirected the jury.

Naylor, aged 30, of Ainsworth Lane, Tonge Moor, was convicted of murder by a jury at Manchester Crown Court and given a mandatory life sentence in December 2001. Lord Justice Rix, sitting with Mr Justice Henriques and Mr Justice Treacy, said Derek Hambleton, aged 26, died in February 2001 after Naylor delivered a single blow with a kitchen knife which "buried itself up to the hilt of the five-inch blade".

She then hid the weapon up her sleeve and walked round to a friend's house where she admitted what she had done. But later she changed her story and, at her trial, claimed Mr Hambleton had killed himself. Lord Justice Rix said Naylor later told police she had drunk around five pints of cider that day and had taken tablets for depression.

Her appeal yesterday in London centred on whether Naylor was so intoxicated as to be incapable of forming the intent to kill her lover.

Lord Justice Rix accepted various submissions by her barrister, David Turner, QC, including that the judge was wrong to concentrate on Naylor's own insistence at her trial that she was not drunk.

Ruling her murder conviction "unsafe", Lord Justice Rix said: "We think that it does mean that there has been a material misdirection in this case.

The pair had had a turbulent relationship and, earlier in the evening, the victim had been heard to plead with her "don't batter me tonight".

No police blood/alcohol tests were done on her, but post mortem results on Mr Hambleton showed he was the equivalent of four times over the legal drink/drive limit.

who the court heard often squabbled,

On the evening Hambleton died, the couple had a petty row during which Naylor picked up the knife and plunged it into her lover's side, the court was told.

No police blood/alcohol tests were done on her.