A police officer raised in North Hampshire who strangled his lover after she revealed their affair to his wife has been sentenced to 10-and-a-half years imprisonment.

Timothy Brehmer, 41, killed mother-of-two Claire Parry after she sent a text message from his phone to his wife, saying: “I am cheating on you.”

Mrs Parry, 41, died during a “melee” in his car in the car park at the Horns Inn in West Parley, Dorset, on May 9 this year, with Brehmer claiming the nurse accidentally suffered the fatal injury while he was trying to push her out of his Citroen car so he could drive away.

He had admitted manslaughter, but was found not guilty of her murder by a jury at Salisbury Crown Court.

Sentencing, Mr Justice Jacobs said: “This is a case where I should sentence you on the basis you lost your self-control following the sending of the text message to your wife where the affair was revealed, rather than on the basis that you had no intention to kill or cause really serious harm.”

“I am sure that you did deliberately take Claire Parry by the neck applying significant force with your forearm or the crook of your elbow for a period of time while she struggled against you, thereby causing the severe neck injuries which the pathologist described.

“The evidence from the pathologist was that those injuries which she described as ‘severe’ on a scale of mild, moderate or severe resulted from the application of significant force to the neck for a period of a minimum 10 to 30 seconds and possibly longer.

“She said it was difficult to envisage a situation where a struggle in the car imparted the necessary degree of force or could explain the extent and severity of the neck injuries.”

The judge said Brehmer would serve two-thirds of his sentence in prison before he could apply for parole.