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A sleep scientist spoke about a bizarre sleepwalking case which saw a man drive miles to his mother-in-law’s house to murder her – but he was found not guilty.
Professor Guy Leschziner, a world-renowned expert in Neurology and Sleep Medicine, appeared on Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett‘s The Diary of a CEO podcast to speak about sleep disorders and how sleepwalking can be used as a defence in a court of law.
The most notorious case occurred in Canada in 1988, when 23-year-old Toronto man Kenneth Parks, was acquitted of murder and attempted murder of his parents in-law.
In the early hours of May 23, 1987, he drove 23km to their house, broke in, assaulted his father-in-law, Denis, and stabbed his mother-in-law Barbara Woods, 42, to death.
Parks, who had gambling debts, claimed he was asleep the whole time and was not aware of what he was doing.