A man slashed his girlfriend's throat with a knife after she asked him to kill her, a court heard.

Mark Watson, 44, wounded Jacqueline Martin after the couple rowed at their flat in Clarendon Road, Hove.

When Watson started packing a bag to leave, he says his partner said she wanted to die.

But moments after he cut her neck with the blade she tried to call an ambulance.

When Miss Martin, who was bleeding heavily, struggled to talk on her mobile phone because of her injury, Watson took over the call, telling the emergency operator he had stabbed his girlfriend at her request.

At Lewes Crown Court Watson admitted aiding and abetting attempted suicide. He denied a charge of attempted murder.

Miss Martin, who is a mother, told the court she still loves Watson and visits him in prison.

Judge Richard Brown told Watson, who has a record of violence, including assaulting a former wife, he faced a lengthy prison sentence.

The judge ordered psychiatric and probation reports to assess Watson's potential risk to the public.

Watson was remanded in custody until July 10, when he will be sentenced.

The court heard the knifing took place at the couple's home in the early hours of September 7 last year. The couple, who had been together for six months, had been celebrating with lager after she earned £30 for an article in the Big Issue, the magazine which supports the homeless.

But the mood changed when she described how she had found Watson and a neighbour in bed together a few weeks earlier.

Miss Martin says she had no memory of what happened immediately before she was stabbed but Watson told police she said she wanted to die.

He asked her: "Are you sure that is what you want?"

She replied: "Just do it."

He used a knife the couple bought a few weeks earlier when they went on a camping holiday to the New Forest.

She was taken to hospital and later had at least 15 stitches in her neck wound. She discharged herself against medical advice later the same day.

Ms Martin told the court: "I remember saying I wish I was dead."

When asked if this meant she wanted Watson to end her life she replied: "Probably. But I don't remember."

She told the court she had suffered from a drink and drug problem as well as the consequences of former abusive relationships and had repeatedly tried to commit suicide.

She said she had taken drug overdoses 11 times and had tried to throw herself off a balcony. She said she wanted Watson out of jail so their relationship could continue.

She said: "He is my partner and I love him very much. If he doesn't come home I feel I am the one being punished, not him, because you are depriving me of somebody I love very much.

"Even though I don't remember what happened as far as I am concerned nothing has gone wrong."