HIS wife was being attacked by an intruder and he had to stop it. When he woke up, his wife lay dead. He had killed her while having a bad dream.

Brian Thomas, who suffers from a sleep disorder, admits killing his wife Christine while they spent a night in their camper van in Wales in July last year, a British court was told, reported AFP.

But the 59-year-old, who has two grown-up daughters with his 57-year-old wife, is pleading not guilty due to insanity, a lawyer said.

Both prosecution and defence have agreed to the plea, saying he did not intend to kill her. So, they are arguing for different not-guilty verdicts.

If the jury finds in favour of the prosecution, he could be sent to a secure mental unit. But if they favour the defence, he will go free.

The court heard the couple had stopped for the night in a carpark, but their sleep was disturbed by young men who gathered there with their cars, revving their engines and screeching their tyres.

So Thomas decided to move the van to another carpark.

But at 3.49am the following morning, he called police to say he thought he had killed his wife. In the call, the Daily Mail said he can be heard crying: "What have I done? I've been trying to wake her.

"I think I've killed my wife. Oh my God. I thought someone had broken in."

Minutes later, when police arrived at the scene to find Thomas crying and shaking, he told them: "She's my world."

He said he had been dreaming that he was fighting with the "boy racers" who had disturbed the couple earlier that night.

He thought he had put one of them in a headlock, but when he woke up he realised it was his wife Christine - his childhood sweetheart.

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