A British expatriate has confessed to killing his partner at their home in an Italian hilltop town, claiming that he lost his temper in reaction to her “obsessive jealousy”.

Michael Whitbread, 75, apologised for stabbing Michele Faiers to death in their home in the village of Verratti in the central Abruzzo region of Italy in October 2023.

He claimed that she had wrongly suspected him of having an affair with another expat woman.

She became obsessively jealous and subjected him to physical and verbal abuse, he told his trial in the town of Lanciano.

Whitbread told the court: “I wish I hadn’t done it and I apologise.”

He claimed that he had taken a knife from the kitchen and presented it to her, asking her to kill him. Instead, an argument erupted and he ended up killing her.