An Aberdeen man who admitted stabbing his father in the neck has been cleared of his murder.
Lewis Webster, from the Craigiebuckler area of the city, was today found not guilty of killing Michael Webster at the 57-year-old’s home in Bearsden, East Dunbartonshire, on January 27 2022.
The former engineer was found dead on his kitchen floor with a knife sticking out of his neck.
There was another blade in his hand, which his 23-year-old son admitted he had “stupidly” put there.
Webster, of Macaulay Drive, had claimed he had been acting in self-defence.
He told jurors he had been scared after Michael came at him with a knife and threatened to kill him.
The High Court in Glasgow heard there was a “struggle” between the pair.
Webster told the trial: “That is when I stabbed him. I do not remember how many times – it was a blur. It all happened so fast.”
The jury returned not guilty verdicts to murder and a separate accusation of attempting to defeat the ends of justice.
‘There are no winners in this case’
Amid highly emotional scenes in court, Lord Matthews went on to state to Webster: “You have been found not guilty of both charges and you are free to leave the dock.”
He was hugged by a sobbing group of people who had attended with him for the trial.
Afterwards, the judge said to the jury: “There are no winners in this case. It is a terrible family tragedy.”
The dad and son had previously been estranged. They had gone out for dinner at a bar in Glasgow’s west end before returning to Michael’s flat.
A neighbour later described hearing a “frightening noise”.
Jurors were played a 999 call that Webster made in the early hours in which he stated about Michael: “I do not think he is okay. I do not want to touch him.”
He claimed his dad tried to assault him and that he “attacked him back”.
Dad tried to attack son with knife
Webster later told police that he had “no other option” that night.
He added: “What would you do if someone ran at you with a knife?”
In his evidence, Webster said him and his dad had been drinking, but had been “getting on well”.
He stated Michael then began “mumbling” about the way his own father died, which Webster had never heard of before.
Webster said that Michael went at him with a knife later that night threatening that he was “going to f***ing kill” him.
The labourer told the trial: “I did not know if he was speaking to his dad or thought I was his dad or something like that.”
Asked by his KC John Scullion how Michael had “expressed” himself to Webster, he replied: “The way an animal looks at you – it was a ghostly stare. I do not know if he thought it was me or not. It was scary.”
Webster accepted he later stabbed his dad in the neck with a knife and that he “fell to the floor”.
Quizzed on how he felt at the time, he said: “Horrible – just pure shock. Imagining that it was not real, trying to tell myself that he was not dead and that this did not happen.”
