A husband stabbed his wife’s lover to death, turned to her and shouted: “Look what you made me do”, a court was told.

An emotional Kayleigh Chessell said she desperately tried to protect Graeme Pethard by acting as a human shield as her husband attacked him with a kitchen knife in the early hours of May 5.

She told Lewes Crown Court that Mr Pethard pleaded for mercy before Carlo Dawes, 35, plunged the knife into his neck and down into his right lung.

The jury has previously been told how Ms Chessell had met Mr Pethard earlier in the year.

They had spent the hours before his death together at her flat in Taunton Road, Bevendean, before Dawes returned home and surprised them.

Ms Chessell told the court: “Graeme was still there asleep next to me and Carlo was standing over him.

“He was asking who he was, then started punching him to wake him up and then hit him over the head with a vodka bottle.”

She described how Mr Pethard started to gather his belongings with blood streaming from his nose but seemed dazed as Dawes punched him.

Fighting back the tears she said Dawes then went into the kitchen and returned with a knife.

She said she positioned herself between the two men as Mr Pethard backed away towards the door in an attempt to get away.

Ms Chessell said: “He was putting his hands up and saying: ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa. What are you doing? Please don’t.’”

As she tried to defend her lover she said Dawes began to “stab around” her to get to Pethard. Unable to reach him she claimed Dawes took the blade in his other hand and lunged over her shoulder before sinking the blade into Mr Pethard’s neck.

She said: “Next thing I knew Graeme said: ‘He’s stabbed me in the neck’. He walked across the room towards the front door but didn’t make it.”

Bleeding heavily from the neck he slid down the wall and collapsed.

Dawes, she told the jury, began to pace around the room before shouting at her: “Look what you’ve made me do.”

She added that as he walked out of the door he threatened to kill her father. Ms Chessell dialled 999 but Mr Pethard was later declared dead.

Under cross examination she admitted that she had originally lied to police when she said that she had “bumped into” Mr Pethard when in fact they had arranged to meet up.

Dawes denies murder. The trial continues.