Christine Rawle told police her husband had been sexually abusing her, court hears

• Watch Sam Blackledge's report on Christine Rawle's police interview

A woman accused of stabbing her husband to death told the police he had been physically and sexually abusing her for many years.

Christine Rawle, 70, is on trial for the alleged murder of Ian Rawle at their north Devon home.

Jurors have been watching footage of Mrs Rawle's police interview in the days after her arrest.

She told detectives Mr Rawle had been doing "awful things of a sexual nature" throughout their marriage and claimed he would headbutt her, kick her and push her.She described graphic sex acts and suggested he would be violent towards her and their son, Tom.

"He was always really angry, he would come home and you could see when he came in, whether he was going to go for me or Tom, or both," she said.

"When he couldn't get an erection, that was my fault because I wasn't attractive enough. But then he started getting angry and blaming me.

"Everything that didn't work in his life, with his work, he'd come home, he would take it out on me.

"Tom left home when he was 14 because Ian was really tough on him. His impotence was....it was all my fault.'

Asked by a police detective whether she wanted to do the sexual acts, Mrs Rawle said: "No, no I did not."

Asked whether she ever sustained any injuries caused by her husband, Mrs Rawle said "yes".

"He headbutted me quite a few times," she said.

"Kicked me in my bad leg. Kicked me down steps. Pushed me forward. He would kick me when I was down. He would hit me in bed."

Asked whether she was scared of Mr Rawle, she said: "Yes."

Christine Rawle also said she feared her husband would tell police she was mentally ill if she reported his abuse.

Asked why she did not call 999 if he was physically and sexually assaulting her, she said: "'Because he would turn round and say to them that I had mental health issues."

She said she talked to him about getting a divorce, but that he told her: "You will regret it."

"He would spit at me, he would call me a fat pig. He said he would poison me. My brakes have gone on the car.

"He said he would let the horses out on to the road."

Asked whether she ever assaulted her husband, she said: "I stuck up for myself on occasion. About 20-odd years ago, I threw a pot at him. It cut his head. They took him away in an ambulance and he jumped out of the ambulance and ran away.

"The things that have happened to me in that house are horrendous. I'm an old woman. Do you think I want to be sexually messed around with at my age?

"I can't explain to you how it feels to wake up and have someone looking at you....trying to put their hands in places...saying to me I'm a f***ing pig.

"I have been tortured. Terrorised."

Christine Rawle denies murder and the trial continues.