Mark Hutt | Murderpedia, the encyclopedia of murderers

Mark Peter HUTT

Classification: Murderer

Characteristics: Parricide - Torture

Number of victims: 1

Date of murder: December 5, 2009

Date of arrest: 7 days after

Date of birth: 1976

Victim profile: Donna Ellen Jones, 33

Method of murder: The body was found badly scalded, beaten, with broken bones, and having been shot with air gun pellets. She died of septic shock from infection due to untreated burns

Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Status: Sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years on June 7, 2013

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Donna Ellen Jones (December 25, 1975 – December 5, 2009) was a Canadian woman tortured to death by her husband, Mark Peter Hutt, in Ottawa, Canada, in 2009.

The 33-year-old's body was found in the basement of her home, badly scalded, beaten, with broken bones, and having been shot with air gun pellets. She died of septic shock from infection due to untreated burns. Hutt was convicted of murder in 2013.

Early life

Jones was raised in a home where she was "belittled" by her father, who taught her that she ought to "honour your husband". She was self-conscious about her weight and appearance. She was a graduate of Carleton University and had a civil service job with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. Her friends used terms such as "bubbly", "outgoing" and "an absolute sunshine" to describe Jones.

Life with Mark Hutt

Jones met Hutt in the summer of 2005, where the two were on the same baseball team. She soon began to pull away from friends and family. Her previously-outstanding performance at her job in the federal public service began to slip. Friends began to notice signs of domestic abuse, such as bruises on Jones' body, and overhearing phone conversations between Jones and Hutt where Hutt screamed abuse at her. He would frequently call her to check up on her when she was with friends.

Before the couple's planned September 2007 wedding, friends planned a formal intervention, begging Jones to call it off, but when it didn't work, backed out of her wedding party. Two years later, Jones's weight had dropped from 162 pounds to 101 pounds.

Hutt was emotionally and financially dependent on Jones. Hundreds of notes found in her home reveal Hutt’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde nature — in one calling Jones a “terrible wife,” in another insisting, “You are my angel.” Jones, previously frugal, was preparing to file for bankruptcy after she had indulged Hutt with his desires for a truck, an ATV, a snowmobile, a snowboard and other items. Several months before Jones's death, oozing burns on her arms appeared, seeming to have become infected, but Jones reportedly refused medical attention.

Murder

Jones was found, dead, on a mattress made of couch pillows, in the basement of her house on December 6, 2009. Hutt admitted to dousing Jones with boiling water, but waited 11 days, after she was no longer breathing, to call 911. Though Hutt claimed Jones was alive and talking three hours before he called 911, forensic evidence indicated that she had died up to 12 hours before the call.

Hutt claimed at first that Jones had fallen into a fire pit, then later that he had accidentally burned his wife 11 days earlier with a pot of boiling water and had tried to treat her at home after she refused to go to the hospital. About 40% of Jones's body had been burned.

Although Jones spoke to a handful of people on the phone after the scalding, including her mother, she didn't tell anyone she was hurt nor call 911 herself. The Crown attorney argued Jones was protecting Hutt because of a “trauma bond”. Friends of Jones made a third-party complaint to police alleging Hutt’s abuse the day after Jones was scalded, but it was left uninvestigated until after her body was found.

Trial

During the autopsy, 29 pellets from an air rifle were found lodged in Jones's skin. Forensic pathologist Christopher Milroy testified that the gun must have been fired from the short distance of a few feet for the pellets to have penetrated the skin. Some pellets were in Jones's body for quite some time and he said Jones showed signs of lead poisoning, although the level was not high enough to poison her. She was likely shot with at least two of those pellets after the scalding.

She also had nine fractured ribs, a broken nose, two black eyes and many cuts, bruises and scrapes on her head, knees and legs. Milroy said these injuries were caused after Jones was burned on November 24, 2009.

Jones's body had other injuries including seven calloused ribs, which suggested an earlier fracture likely caused by kicks, as well as two recent rib fractures, a broken left finger, fractured right wrist and an earlier forearm break known as a "nightstick fracture", caused by a blow to the arm raised in a defensive position.

Joel Fish, medical director of the burn unit of the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, testified as a burn expert. According to Fish, had Jones received proper medical treatment, she would have had a "virtually 100 per cent" chance of survival.

Hutt's defence lawyer Lorne Goldstein did not contest that Hutt abused Jones, but pointed out that her many broken bones, bruises and cuts did not cause her death. Goldstein conceded that Hutt had tortured Jones "beyond comprehension". The defence presented no witnesses.

Hutt pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of criminal negligence causing death. The Crown rejected his plea and argued he was guilty of first-degree murder. A jury took less than a day to deliberate and on June 7, 2013, found Hutt guilty of first-degree murder. Life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years, the maximum penalty in Canada, is the automatic sentence.

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'Evil' Mark Hutt found guilty of murdering wife with boiling water

By Megan Gillis - Ottawa Sun

Friday, June 07, 2013

OTTAWA — Donna Jones' family, friends and colleagues erupted into cheers Friday as the jury declared Mark Hutt guilty of murdering the burned, battered wife he kept torturing for the 12 days it took her to die.

"Pay the piper now, you prick," one shouted at an expressionless Hutt, 36.

"An evil man" was convicted of his "evil crimes," Jones' "elated" brother, Derek, said after pumping his fist in victory.

"He will pay for the rest of his life," he said.

"Justice has prevailed and the dear Lord will take care of him in the afterlife."

The toll of his sister's "senseless" death in December 2009 has been enormous.

"All she wanted to do was have a loving, caring family and this is what she got from an evil man," Jones said.

If Donna, 33 when she died, could speak, "she's saying nobody can do this to anybody and if you need help, get help," he said.

Life with no chance of parole for 25 years is the only sentence for first-degree murder but it won't be imposed until June 25 so Jones' loved ones can prepare victim impact statements.

The jury returned the verdict after less than a day of deliberations that began with Judge Robert Maranger's warning to put aside "any hatred" of Hutt.

They'd heard a month of evidence detailing Jones' life of depraved abuse and agonizing death from the infected burns that covered 40% of her broken body.

Prosecutor Vikki Bair argued Hutt deliberately scalded Jones with boiling water after four years of physical, mental and financial abuse then chose for her to die of infection, calling 911 only then so he could say it was an accident.

A broken nose, head trauma and at least two of the 29 air gun pellets in her flesh happened after she was scalded, a pathologist testified.

"We think it's justice — justice for Donna and honour for Donna," Bair said of the verdict.

She said she's grateful to jurors and hopes that insight into the "dynamics of a horribly abusive relationship" will educate.

"We may not see as much victim-blaming in the future," Bair said.

Defence lawyer Lorne Goldstein argued Hutt was guilty of criminal negligence causing death because he didn't want Jones — his defender and source of cash and emotional support — to die and knew she'd recovered from horrific burns before.

Det. Michael Hudson said it's been difficult to see Jones' family, friends and co-workers — who tried to intervene — wondering if they could have saved her.

"Everyone did everything they could possibly do," he said. "There's only one villain here and he's going to jail for a long time."

‘Monster’ Mark Hutt slowly killed Donna Jones

By Megan Gillis - Ottawa Sun

Friday, June 07, 2013

“Don’t worry about me,” Donna Jones told her mother — who thought she had a cold — on the phone days before she’d die in her own basement of the stinking, oozing burns that covered almost half her body.

“I’ve got my Mark here and he’s gonna take care of me.”

When Hutt finally called 911 after Jones was stiff with death, scarcely an inch of her body wasn’t marked by his depravity.

He’d drenched her, by accident, he’d claim with a pot of boiling water 12 days before.

He left her with old fractures that had never been treated including a “nightstick” break to her arm as if she’d warded off a blow and broken ribs like she’d been kicked.

He’d shot her 29 times with a pellet gun.

Some of her horrible injuries including a broken nose, fresh head trauma and at least two of the pellets had been inflicted after she’d been hideously burned.

A window was open to the winter chill on that December 2009 morning as if to hide the reek of Jones’ septic body.

It filled every part of the outwardly-tidy Bayshore-area home she had scrimped to buy and invited Hutt to share.

It became a “house of horrors,” prosecutor Vikki Bair told the jury.

Jones’ blood dotted and streaked the walls and floors, a bathroom door was pried open and the arsenal of weapons including two pellet guns and half-a-dozen knives — two with red stains.

Neatly packed were mens’ clothes and the expensive toys Jones had bankrupted herself to buy Hutt, who’d been making calls to his ex-girlfriend as she lay dying.

“He had used her up,” Bair told the jury, “and he was moving on.”

Yet Jones never used the phone next to her bed of couch cushions on the floor to call for help as she lay battered, burned and broken.

She would have been in “exquisite” pain, a burn expert testified. Treatment would have saved her.

After four years of abuse, she was a “vacant drone,” Bair contended, fatally snared in a “trauma bond.”

It was forged by Hutt’s savage abuse mixed, Jekyll-and-Hyde style, with the declarations of love in hundreds of notes to his “angel” found around their home.

“The prison guard is in your head,” explained Deborah Sinclair, who’s counselled thousands of battered women and hundreds of abusers.

“Donna just wasn’t Donna anymore,” was how friend Mike Paquette put it, describing the smart, bubbly, “instigator” she used to be.

She was a success she’d put herself through Carleton and had a civil service job and many friends but she’d grown up with a father who belittled her and said women should “honour your husband.”

She was self-conscious about a lazy eye and her weight although she’d weigh just 101 pounds at her death and told a therapist she feared she’d always be alone.

Then, at 30, she met Mark Hutt.

It was a whirlwind courtship with the roofer who said he’d had a rough childhood but was turning his life around.

A month before their 2007 wedding, friends staged an intervention begging Jones to call it off.

They’d seen Hutt “seething” with rage when she danced with the teenage best man at a wedding. Jones fled outings to buy Hutt orange juice or cook him dinner then stopping coming at all.

She seemed “dazed, medicated.” She had bruises shaped like handprints and marks on her wrists she said were from rough sex.

“Relationships like this can escalate,” friend Melanie Houle warned. “They don’t usually have happy endings, people die.”

Jones went ahead with her wedding without the friends Hutt drove from her life.

Then colleagues saw her injuries get worse and excuses feebler. Hutt screamed abuse at his wife during his incessant calls.

“Where are you and what are you doing?” Crystal Lang heard Hutt yelling.

“You better be f---ing home tonight, Donna Jones. If you’re not here, I’ll kill you, your family and myself.”

“Mark, I will be home,” is all she said.

Jones behaviour towards Hutt was “mothering” – she confided he needed the support only she could give.

By the summer of 2009, Jones wore turtlenecks in the heat and heavy make-up that didn’t hide her bruises.

She had a limp that never went away, a split lip that never healed and she had shocking burns that covered both arms and legs.

A cooking mishap, she said.

“I fear that if you don’t leave him, then he will kill you,” Karen Gorman warned.

Tears rolled from Jones’ big, blue eyes down the “mask” her face had become.

“It’s not as bad as you think,” she said.

As Jones lay dying, her colleagues talked to police about confronting her about Hutt’s abuse when she returned to work.

She never did.

Hutt didn’t testify but told a detective he’d never meant to burn his wife and begged her over and over to get help but she feared hospitals.

He sobbed and sobbed but his eyes were dry.

“I have an anger problem,” he said. He said his parents were drunks and he was beaten by his mother’s boyfriend and his father, the same father who employed him and he called dozens of times as Jones lay dying.

“Why wouldn’t you go to the hospital?” Hutt crooned during one interview, when the detective left the room but the video camera was still running.

“Sweetheart, I told you this was going to happen.”

He said first that Jones fell into a fire pit.

Then he said that he hit a pot in anger that he was using to cook the spaghetti she “loved to death” for supper, not realizing she was behind him.

Jones’ burns showed areas of “sparing” shaped like her arms crossed across her body, as if she’d known the deluge of boiling water was coming, Bair said.

Hutt said his wife fought kicking and screaming to avoid the hospital the day before she died, when a pathologist said she’d have been “lying there dying and not doing anything else.”

The truth was that Jones had really been dying for years.

Her Mark took care of her.

Crown closes case in Mark Hutt murder trial

CBC News

May 31, 2013

Closing arguments are set for Wednesday after the Crown closed its case and the defence chose not to call evidence in the first-degree murder trial of Mark Hutt.

Hutt has pleaded not guilty to the accusation his actions led to the death of his wife, Donna Jones, in December 2009.

On Friday, a forensic pathologist detailed the injuries suffered by Jones, which he found during the autopsy.

Dr. Christopher Milroy told the court Jones had extensive burns and injuries, including nine fractured ribs and 29 air gun pellets embedded in her body.

Milroy also said Jones died in December 2009 of septic shock after infected burns caused her circulation to stop and her organs to fail.

Crown attorneys questioned Milroy on the other extensive injuries discovered during the autopsy.

Jones refused to go to hospital, Hutt told police

Hutt called 911 at 9:15 a.m. on Dec. 6, 2009 to say his wife had stopped breathing and he feared she had died.

He told police in an interview previously shown in court he had accidentally burned his wife 11 days earlier with a pot of boiling water and had tried to treat her at home after she refused to go to the hospital.

But Milroy said, while there were bandages on Jones's right and left fingers and left forearm, the majority of the burns were undressed, including her back, where the deepest burns were. About 40 per cent of Jones's body was burned.

Hutt also told police he and his wife had just been talking about Christmas gifts at about 6 a.m. on Dec. 6, three hours before he made the 911 call.

Jones died 9 hours before alleged conversation

"That's impossible," said Milroy, who put Jones's time of death at about 12 hours before the call.

Jones's body had a number of other injuries including seven calloused ribs, which suggested an earlier fracture likely caused by kicks, as well as two recent rib fractures, said Milroy.

Jones also had a broken left finger, fractured right wrist and a forearm injury that suggested a "blow across the arm," he said.

Milroy said he also found 29 air gun pellets in Jones's body, with most embedded about one centimetre into her body.

Air gun pellets suggest close range shots

The gun must be fired from the short distance of a few feet for pellets from an air gun to penetrate skin, said Milroy.

Milroy said some pellets were in Jones's body for quite some time and he said Jones showed signs of lead poisoning.

At least two of the pellets were "likely" fired at Jones after she was scalded, said Milroy.

On Thursday the forensic officer — acting Sgt. Stephen Jones — said police found a BB pellet gun in the powder room on the main floor of the home, as well as a high-powered pellet rifle in a suitcase.

The weapon was a high speed "Savage" brand pellet rifle with a scope. Sgt. Jones said forensic tests showed that it was in the "firing" position and it could fire with enough power to injure and kill.

Forensic officer testifies about state of Jones's body in Hutt trial

CBC News

May 28, 2013

The jury in the trial of a man accused of scalding his wife with boiling water and leaving her to die heard from a forensic officer that it was difficult to get her fingerprints because she was so badly burned.

Mark Hutt, 36, has pleaded not guilty to a charge of first-degree murder in the death of Donna Jones in Dec. 2009. The Crown alleges he physically and psychologically abused his wife.

Sgt. Stephen Jones, a forensic officer who testified on Tuesday, gave a detailed description of the crime scene in the basement of the victim's home and testified about signs of physical violence.

Forensic officers found red stains, that could be blood, on walls, a hallway floor and on stair posts. There was also a broken door.

Red stains were also found on a hair scrunchie, on a sneaker and on the collar of a coat.

Jones also described the smell he confronted upon entering the home.

"There was some decomposing odour. It was an acrid, sickly smell, nothing like I've smelled before," said the police officer.

Sgt. Jones said he found three pots in the sink and a pellet gun. He said he noticed burns and many bruises that looked like they had been there awhile.

Sgt. Jones also testified that more than 30 pellets were found in the victim's body.

The jury heard that Hutt and Jones both faced financial problems. Hutt declared bankruptcy in June 2006, around the time the couple got engaged, and Jones started paying his bankruptcy bills shortly before their marriage in 2007. In 2009 Jones declared bankruptcy.

Witnesses previously testified that the normally frugal Jones started buying Hutt expensive gifts after they met. She bought him an ATV and a pool table and assumed his car payments.

Hutt's cell phone records show calls made outside couple's house after Jones scalded

Hutt's cell phone records show he called Jones at work a dozen times per day. His calls to her stopped on Nov. 25 2009, the day that Hutt said he accidentally threw boiling water on her.

His cell phone records also show that calls were frequently made outside the couple's residency after his wife was scalded.

After Nov. 25 Hutt 's cell phone was used in Aylmer, Que., Vanier and Kirkwood. One call was made to a Merivale paintball store. He also called his divorced parents and an ex-girlfriend.

The lead investigators found handcuffs, a bow and arrow and a sword at his residence.

Mark Hutt portrays himself as hero in videotaped police interview

By Christie Blatchford - Canada.com

May 23, 2013

OTTAWA — And so Thursday in Ontario Superior Court, before judge and jury, did the late Donna Jones join the ranks of those who carelessly caused or invited their own deaths or who are otherwise to blame.

Their number is legion.

To the list of saucy children who fractured their own skulls, reckless babies who threw themselves down stairs, mothers who slipped drunkenly under the water in the bath and wanton teenagers who drove their parents’ cars into canals, we can now add Jones, federal public servant.

She was reported dead on Dec. 6, 2009, in a 911 call from Mark Hutt, her husband of two years. She had suffered massive burns to almost half her body, and, as an autopsy would later reveal, a litany of other injuries as well.

Friends and colleagues were convinced she was being battered by Hutt, and had even made a third-party complaint of domestic violence to Ottawa Police. A confrontation was in the works when Jones was next at the office.

Hutt, now 36, is pleading not guilty to first-degree murder.

t was through his three-hour videotaped police interview later the same day he painted the picture of his wife as essentially responsible for her own demise and himself as the heroic figure who nobly tried to save her.

He was boiling water for the spaghetti she loved – “She loved it to death,” as he said without a lick of irony — when she came up behind him at the stove and abruptly broke it to him the relationship wasn’t working.

“I’m angry,” he said. “I’m upset. My life is over, my wife doesn’t love me any more.”

He asked to be left alone and thought she left the room. Then, out of frustration, he just “hit that thing,” the pot of water, and too late realized she was just behind him, crouching as she looked for some Tupperware.

“It drenched her!” he told Sergeant Mike Hudson.

He was under no illusion about how serious it was.

He told her repeatedly, “Donna, you’re burned head to toe,” “it’s going to get worse” and if she didn’t get medical help, “something bad” would happen.

Hutt immediately demanded they go to hospital, he said, but Jones refused. “She didn’t want to get me in trouble,” he said.

What ensued, over the next 11 days, was a story of his magnificent sacrifice in the name of love.

He stayed up with her all night, “to make sure she was OK,” bought endless bandages and ointment at the drugstore (and, it turned out, KitKats for himself), begged her to go to hospital, threatened suicide and divorce if she didn’t) and, in the latter days, even performed mouth-to-mouth when she stopped breathing.

On the first occasion, the day before she died, “She came right back to me,” he said, snapping his fingers to show Hudson how quick it had been. “She even joked about what she was going to get me for Christmas.”

He pressed the hospital issue again, and this time, “She hit me in the back of the head like you wouldn’t believe” and protested “’I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine.’”

The second time, the night before she died, she had fallen, and Hutt again swung into action, “blew in her mouth once – and she was fine.” She told him, he said, “ ‘You saved my life. Thank you.’ ”

None of this washed with Hudson.

It was a Sunday; the police computer system was down, so he had little information, only that Jones had been terribly hurt and that Hutt had first explained the burns by saying she had fallen, drunk, into a fire pit while at a work conference in Cornwall, Ont.

But Hutt had ditched the Cornwall story as untrue and said he had panicked. He snuffled throughout the interview and appeared to be crying, but Hudson never saw a tear. Later on, Hutt appeared to be vomiting, but Hudson checked the waste basket and saw no evidence of that, only a little spit.

Though the interview had begun with Hutt being treated as a grieving spouse, Hudson was soon formally cautioning him: He had admitted causing Jones’ burns; he conceivably could face charges; he was not under arrest but could stop the interview right now or talk to a lawyer.

“I know, I know,” Hutt said. “But it’s the right thing to do.”

On several occasions, when Hudson left the room and Hutt was alone with the camera, he engaged in melodramatic monologues.

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” he wailed in the first of them.

“But I have to tell the truth. I can’t lie. Why wouldn’t you just go to the hospital? Why? Why? Why? Why wouldn’t you just go?

“I shoulda just brought her anyway … Sweetheart, why? Why wouldn’t you let me bring you to the hospital? Why wouldn’t you let me bring you there? Why? Why did you have to fight me over it? Why? Sweetheart, why, why, why?”

He had extraordinary recall about some things.

For instance, he remembered his wife wetting or soiling herself on several occasions and how, selflessly, he had cleaned her up.

Alas for him, the jurors have been told because of the severity of her burns, Jones’ kidneys and bowels would have shut down after a day or two.

But when Hudson was pressing him for more detail about the scalding, and asked if he had been burned as he sent the pot flying, Hutt replied slowly, “Nothing, not a darned thing. I wear hoodies a lot.”

“Did it (the hoodie) get wet? Hudson asked.

“I guess,” Hutt mused, then told what was, even by his standards, a stupendous nose-stretcher, “I didn’t really pay attention to myself.”

Several times, he actually said, of his newly departed wife, “She just wouldn’t listen to me,” as when he told Hudson, “I really don’t care any more, sir … There’s really nothing left for me to live for. I never meant to hurt my wife. I begged her (to go to hospital). She just wouldn’t listen to me; I don’t know why.”

Several times, Hudson asked him “if there’s anything else” he should know about, any other injuries the autopsy would discover, if police should expect any suggestion he had hurt his wife.

Once, Hutt remembered the time Jones, who between them, he said, was after all clumsy, had fallen down and broken a wrist. Once, he remembered elbowing her in the nose, but unintentionally in his sleep, and oh yes, he confided, as if he’d had to dredge up the memory, there was the time he was target shooting up at the cottage (it was a trailer) “without knowing my wife was out back, picking up bottles, and I shot her in the kneecap.”

Well, who doesn’t have difficulty remembering the time he shot his wife?

First responders describe crime scene during Hutt trial

CBC News

May 21, 2013

A paramedic and a police detective testified Tuesday about the extensive injuries they found on Donna Jones's body in December 2009 after responding to a 911 call about her death.

The jury at the trial of Mark Hutt, an Ottawa man charged with first-degree murder after Jones's death, also heard the 911 call Hutt made on Dec. 6, 2009, and looked at crime scene photos for the first time.

Hutt, 36, has pleaded not guilty.

Ottawa police Det. Tara Anderson, who responded to the 911 call, described the scene at the house as "terrible."

"I've never seen anything like this in my life," she told the court.

Anderson said Hutt told her Jones was drunk when she fell into a fire at a friend's party in Cornwall, and that co-workers patted her down. Anderson testified Hutt told her that when Jones got home, she refused to go to the hospital.

The detective testified she saw severe burns on the victim's stomach, arms and sides. Jones also had two black eyes, scrapes and holes in her legs, Anderson said.

She also told court that Jones "looked like she had been dragged behind a car on a gravel road," and she described Hutt as "agitated and hysterical."

Jones's face swollen, paramedic testifies

Paramedic Logan Martin testified that Jones' face was swollen so much she couldn't open the victim's eyes to check her pupils.

Martin said when she lifted Jones's T-shirt to check the burn injuries, Jones's shirt was sticking to the wounds.

The court heard that Hutt gave police elaborate reasons for Jones's injuries, and that he said he tried to treat her burns himself.

Anderson testified he told police that while he was carrying her to the bathroom she fell and a "large chunk of her hair fell out." He said that she also hit her head on a bed post and on a bathroom wall.

She also said Hutt told police he pawned things to pay for bandages that he put on the burns on her arms.

Anderson said Hutt didn't cry when he was told his wife was dead.

Accused in murder trial called 'controlling and obsessive'

CBC News

May 10, 2013

A childhood friend of a woman found dead in her own home in December 2009 has testified in an Ottawa court that the victim's husband was "controlling and obsessive."

Mark Hutt, 36, has pleaded not guilty to a charge of first-degree murder in the death of his wife, Donna Jones.

Krista Moulds testified Friday that she had been friends with Jones since they were 12 years old, but that she completely lost contact with the victim one month after Jones's 2007 wedding to Hutt.

Crown prosecutor Meaghan Cunningham alleged Hutt scalded his wife with boiling water and then left her to die. Cunningham said that after Hutt burned Jones, her wounds became infected and she descended into septic shock and died 11 days later.

Hutt initially told police that his wife fell into a fire pit at a work gathering. He told police that she didn't want to go to the hospital.

Heartbroken over breakup

Moulds testified that Hutt followed Jones around and insisted on knowing who she spoke to. Moulds also said Hutt did not have friends other than his wife.

She said that when Jones first met Hutt she was still heartbroken over a recent breakup.

Moulds said Jones had confided in her that Hutt had a rough upbringing and that he had threatened to commit suicide if she ever left him.

When Moulds confronted her friend twice about bruises in the shape of handprints on her arm, her friend told her it was because she fell off of Hutt's ATV and that his dog jumped on her.

Moulds was supposed to be Jones's maid of honour and recounted to the court, in tears, the day that they went shopping for a wedding dress together.

"I had no joy. Seeing her in an unhealthy relationship, I didn't want her to marry that man. I was fearful for her," said Moulds.

After Jones purchased the dress, Moulds said her friend called Hutt, excited to tell him how proud she was that she found a beautiful gown and tiara for just $500. Moulds said Hutt just wanted to know if she had done the laundry.

Mike Paquette, another childhood friend of Jones, told the court that their group of friends tried to befriend Hutt, but he never seemed interested in getting to know them.

"I can't remember a single time he smiled or joked with the group. I never heard Donna say good things (about Hutt), like he's so awesome or romantic," said Paquette.

Both Moulds and Paquette refused to attend Jones's wedding in September 2007 and she stopped talking to them shortly after that.

Hutt's immediate family, his mother and step-brother, have not been to the courthouse during this case yet.

Donna Jones's mother sat two aisles behind Hutt and wept during testimony on Friday.

Victim in murder trial was 'always laughing', brother says

CBC News

May 09, 2013

The younger brother of a woman who died after her husband allegedly scalded her with boiling water described her as shy but always laughing, and said he was close to her until she got married.

Donna Ellen Jones-Hutt, 33, was found dead in her own home in December 2009.

Her husband, Mark Hutt, 36, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder.

On Wednesday, Crown prosecutor Meaghan Cunningham alleged Hutt scalded her with boiling water and then left her to die.

On Thursday, Derek Jones's voice cracked at times as he described his sister, often looking directly in the eyes of the man accused of killing her.

Jones described his sister as "a bowlful of jelly, she was always laughing and willing to help others." He also described her as shy and said she "didn't have much success with boys."

Sister became withdrawn

He said that as his sister's relationship with Hutt progressed he noticed that she became withdrawn. Jones told the jury that he tried to stop his sister from marrying Hutt, but she refused.

He also testified that he urged his sister get a prenuptial agreement because she had a job, a government pension and savings, whereas Hutt was broke.

Jones said that on random visits to her home he noticed she was buying Hutt expensive gifts, like an all-terrain vehicle and a new pool table. He also noticed punch holes in her walls.

Jones said a few weeks before his sister's wedding he and her closest girlfriends confronted her about suspecting abuse in the relationship and wanted her to leave her fiancé. He said she denied the abuse and refused to leave Hutt.

When her friends threatened to withdraw from the wedding party, Jones-Hutt responded by getting new bridesmaids, Jones testified.

He said that when the couple married in 2007, Hutt stopped coming to family functions.

"Donna wasn't her happy-go-lucky self. She became cold, suspicious, fearful. She wasn't herself, she was a drone," he said.

Jones said he noticed more physical injuries on his sister after the marriage. He said she had a broken wrist that required surgical pins to hold it together, and he testified that she told him she had slipped on some rocks.

He also said she blamed burns on her hands on a pot handle that broke while she was making pasta.

Wounds became infected, Crown alleges

The crown alleged Wednesday that after Hutt burned Jones-Hutt, her wounds became infected and she descended into septic shock and died 11 days later.

Hutt initially told police that his wife fell into a fire pit at a work gathering. He told police that she didn't want to go to the hospital.

Earlier on Thursday, Deborah Anne Sinclair, a domestic violence expert and a crown witness, was cross-examined. She said victims seek to protect abusers, even if it is to their own detriment.

The trial is expected to last seven weeks.

Wife battered and fatally burned by husband, Crown alleges

CBC News

May 08, 2013

An Ottawa man scalded his wife with boiling water and then left her to die in the basement of her home, a Crown prosecutor alleged on the opening day of a first-degree murder trial.

Mark Hutt, 36, has pleaded not guilty to the first-degree murder charge in connection with the December 2009 death of his wife, 33-year-old Donna Ellen Jones-Hutt.

Jones-Hutt's body was found battered and burned on a dirty mattress in the basement of her home in Ottawa's west end in December 2009.

Hutt, dressed in a black suit, sat in an Ottawa courtroom in the prisoner's box across from the judge as the trial began Wednesday.

In her opening statement, Crown prosecutor Meaghan Cunningham told the jury Jones-Hutt's body was found with third and fourth degree burns. She had two black eyes, a broken nose, bruises, scabs and nine rib fractures.

"Mark Hutt systemically abused Donna Jones — physically, psychologically, financially," said Cunningham.

Jones-Hutt 'bubbly' before meeting Hutt: Crown

Cunningham said before Jones-Hutt met Hutt she was bubbly, a hard worker, paid off her student loans and bought a house on her own. Jones was a federal public servant who went to Algonquin College and Carleton University. The couple met in the summer of 2005 and were married in 2007.

"This strong intelligent woman became withdrawn and completely devoted to protecting the man who abused her," said Cunningham.

The crown alleges that after Hutt burned Jones-Hutt, her wounds became infected and she descended into septic shock and died 11 days later.

Cunningham said a police officer said Jones-Hutt looked like she was "dragged behind a car on a gravel road."

Hutt initially told police that his wife fell into a fire pit at a work gathering. He told police that she didn't want to go to the hospital.

Friends planned to intervene, Crown says

The Crown also said friends of Jones-Hutt planned to confront her about the abusive relationship on December 7, the day after she died.

Deborah Anne Sinclair, a domestic violence expert and a crown witness, sat in the witness box after the crown's opening statements. She was called to testify to explain how an intelligent, independent and sociable woman can become trapped in an abusive relationship.

Sinclair said domestic violence cuts across all cultures and socio-economic backgrounds and said people abuse their partners to gain compliance and make spouses follow their rules.

Sinclair said victims of domestic abuse may isolate themselves because of shame. She said many victims of domestic violence don't want the relationship to end, they want the abuse to stop.

In the research she has seen, Sinclair said most women who are killed by partners are murdered as they try to leave the relationship.

The Crown said they also intend to call as witnesses Jones-Hutt's family and friends, the detectives involved with the case and the medical examiner who completed the autopsy.

Ottawa man charged with murder in wife's death

Donna Ellen Jones-Hutt mourned as caring sister, bubbly friend

CBC News

December 12, 2009

A 33-year-old Ottawa man has been charged with second-degree murder after his wife's body was found in a west end home last weekend.

Mark Peter Hutt, 33, was to appear in court Sunday, accused in the death of 33-year-old Donna Ellen Jones-Hutt, Ottawa police said Saturday in a release.

An obituary at legacy.com says Hutt was Jones-Hutt's husband.

Jones-Hutt's body was found around 9:30 a.m. last Sunday in a home on Barwell Avenue, a few blocks east of Bayshore Shopping Centre, north of Highway 417 and south of Richmond Road. Police said her death is Ottawa's seventh homicide of the year.

Hutt was arrested Friday afternoon following an investigation and the examination of autopsy results.

Loved sports and children

Jones-Hutt's family, friends and former co-workers at the Canada Revenue Agency and Canadian Food Inspection Agency remembered her as a cheerful, caring, vibrant woman who loved sports and children. She is beaming and surrounded by friends in most of the dozens of photos posted on a memorial page on Facebook.

Her sister Jennifer Jones described her as "the best sister."

"She always listened and made me believe in myself," Jennifer Jones wrote on the Facebook page.

Her brother Derek Jones said Jones-Hutt was at times both his best friend and his worst enemy.

"Throughout all the good and the bad, she was there for me," he wrote. "She could tell when something was bothering me and always had a shoulder to cry on."

Her high school friend Natalie Waldorf, who started the Facebook page, described Jones-Hutt as a cheerful, bubbly woman who could always make her laugh.

"Your personality was one that people just naturally gravitated to," Waldorf wrote. "You were one of the most kind, generous, sensitive people I have ever known."