Wife stabs estranged husband after learning he euthanized their rescue dogs: ‘Just saw red’

A heartbroken British dog owner allegedly “saw red” and stabbed her estranged husband after he revealed he had euthanized her two cherished rescue dachshunds.

Claire Bridger, 64, stood trial for attempted murder after allegedly stabbing her husband of nearly 40 years, Keith Bridger, in the chest and abdomen during a visit to his Norfolk home on July 17, 2025, after he told her he had put down their pups, the Mirror reported.

Claire, a registered school nurse, testified in Norwich Crown Court earlier this month that she struggled to cope with the separation in the months leading up to the attack and was prescribed medication, took time off work — and was pushed over the edge when she discovered the dogs were dead.

She told the court she suffered “temporary amnesia” due to a combination of stress and alcohol and that she “saw red” after learning the couple’s beloved dachshunds had been put to sleep.

The mother of two said she never intended to kill Keith, but admitted she intended to cause him harm.

Prosecutors said the couple adopted one rescue dog in March 2020, shortly before the COVID-19 lockdown, and another approximately a year later.

The stabbing occurred about a year after the couple separated, with the dogs remaining in Keith’s care.

However, after the breakup, Keith was unable to keep the pets — described as having “behavioral issues” — at his one-bedroom home and, after failed attempts to rehome them, decided to have them put down, the Daily Mail reported.

Claire said one of her daughters urged her to return home, warning the dogs would otherwise have to be put down because they were difficult to care for. Keith ultimately decided to euthanize the pups.

“I thought it was nonsense. I thought that they would never put the dogs down, no matter what,” Claire told the court. “There was no need … I thought it was a demand to make me come home.”

Claire recalled knowing something was wrong the moment she arrived at her estranged husband’s home on the day of the attack.

“I just suddenly thought, I can’t hear the dogs because they were yappy,” she said.

Keith had just returned from a motorcycle ride when she confronted him and demanded to know where the dachshunds were.

“I shouted, ‘Where are the dogs?’ and he didn’t answer me,” she recalled. “He was taking his helmet off, and I beeped my horn and shouted it again.”

After asking a third time, Claire said she “started to feel a little bit anxious.”

She told the court that it was when “he turned round facing me in the car and he said, ‘You know where the dogs are. The vets wrote to you.’”

“I said I had a text from the vets and he said, ‘You know what happened to the dogs. The dogs are dead. I had them put down,’” she recalled.

Stricken by grief, Claire said realizing the dogs had been euthanized felt like “an explosion in my head,” and she remembers stepping out of her car before blacking out.

“I don’t know what happened to me. I would never have intentionally tried to hurt Keith, let alone try to kill him,” she told the court.

She said her next memory was a neighbor dragging her off her husband. Prosecutors said Claire was screaming, “he killed my dogs,” when police arrived, adding that she “just saw red.”

Keith, who was still attending mediation sessions with his wife at the time, was treated for life-threatening injuries at the scene.

Claire told the court the knife was in her car because it was bent and had been placed in a bag of garbage she was going to take to the local dump.

She said the knife fell out of the bag and beside the driver’s seat, so she tossed it onto the front passenger seat.

Keith told the court he had not told his wife the pups were euthanized, but said he believed she already knew after unsuccessful attempts to rehome them.

He recalled her becoming “almost hysterical” when he told her moments before the attack.

Following a five-day trial, the jury unanimously found the mother of two not guilty of attempted murder, but convicted her of wounding with intent.

She is scheduled to be sentenced on March 20.