Bargain Hunt’s Charles Hanson is accused of carrying out a decade of violence against his wife (Image: Jacob King/PA Wire)
The wife of television auctioneer Charles Hanson was “paralysed with fear” when her husband was violent towards her while she was pregnant, a court has heard.
Rebecca Hanson told Derby Crown Court on Tuesday that on another occasion her husband, who is accused of hurting and leaving marks on her during 10 years of violence, threatened to burn her with embers from a fire.
Mrs Hanson appeared behind a screen in the courtroom to block her from the view of the defendant and the public gallery.
Mr Hanson, who is best known for his appearances on Bargain Hunt and Flog It!, is charged with controlling or coercive behaviour, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and assault by beating, which he has denied.
Mr Hanson appeared in court wearing a black suit, while sat in the dock with members of his family supporting him.
Bargain Hunt star Charles Hanson appeared in court on Tuesday (Image: PA)
His wife told the jury of seven women and five men that their marriage was “generally OK” at the beginning before the violence “escalated”.
Mrs Hanson said she was “petrified” when the first incident happened in 2012, around two years after they married, when her husband “went for” her while she was five or six months pregnant with a baby the couple later lost.
She told the court: “Charles had obviously had an operation for testicular cancer and I was pregnant. It’s common that when Charles is ill he gets extra irritable and angry.”
Mrs Hanson said that during an argument she threw an empty cardboard box for cappuccino sachets which landed on the floor two metres away from him.
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Charles Hanson has denied all allegations against him (Image: Jacob King/PA Wire)
Charles Hanson’s wife has alleged he began assaulting her just two years into their marriage (Image: Jacob King/PA Wire)
She told the jury: “He just went for me. He just ran towards where I was stood in the door frame. I turned around to protect my stomach and my baby. He got me round the throat.
“He’s behind me with his arm around my throat, tight, with my head back.
“It felt like a very long time… I think realistically probably about four, five seconds, but it felt like minutes. I froze. I was absolutely petrified and in shock.
“I completely froze, I was paralysed with fear. I could not believe he was doing it. I think he was shocked at what he had done, I could not believe what he had done especially because I was pregnant.”
The trial of Bargain Hunt and Flog It! auctioneer continued today (February 11) at Derby Crown Court where his wife Mrs Hanson has taken the stand to testify against her TV star husband.
The 46-year-old is accused by the prosecution of carrying out a decade of violence against his spouse which began just two years after their 2010 wedding.
On day one of the trial on Monday (February 10) the court heard how he allegedly put her in a headlock, threw a phone at her, and pushed and prodded her from around two years into their marriage.
Messages sent by the alleged victim to her mother were revealed to the jury in which she told how Hanson had left her bruised from assaults and had “blown”.
Messages between the defendant and victim showed he told her how “I can go for sessions for my anger,” prosecutor Stephen Kemp said.
Hanson denies charges of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, assault by beating and engaging and controlling and coercive behaviour all of which are alleged to have happened when they lived together in Church Road, Quarndon.
She told the jury there were “14 or 15” different incidents involving arguments or violence during their marriage. She described the lockdown as “a bit of a nightmare for us” saying “he got angry a lot.”
Describing another incident, she told the court that during an argument in their bedroom he began filming her and she snatched the phone from him to which he grabbed her wrist to get it back off her.
The prosecutor asked Mrs Hanson about a second, later, incident where Hanson is alleged to have grabbed her by the arm. She said: “What shocked me was that when I looked at my arm, the fingerprint (marks) had come through the arms of a thick woolly jumper, I was wearing thick woolly clothes that day.”
Asked how it felt she said: “Really painful, it really hurt, Charles left the room and I phoned my dad in floods of tears.” When Mr Kemp asked: “Why did you not call the police?” she replied: “When it starts, you hope it is going to end. He apologises, you think it is going to get better, you have a bit of hope.”
Hanson is being supported in court by his parents as he has been for every hearing since he was charged. The trial continues.