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EastEnders’ Whitney Dean (played by Shona McGarty) was stalked by Leo King (Tom Wells) for months before hiding out in her attic and surprising the market trader with a knife. Leo attacked his ex-girlfriend after she refused to tell him that the abuse she’d suffered at the hands of his father, Tony King (Chris Coghill) was a lie. Whitney narrowly escaped with her life but Leo was killed in the clash and the market trader is now faced with a murder charge. Will she be found guilty of the crime or will she be able to walk out of court and finally move on with her life?
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Whitney was horrified when she discovered Leo’s true identity and became a shell of her former self when he carried out a sinister stalking campaign.
Leo humiliated Whitney in front of her loved ones in the Queen Vic by making her ‘confess’ to lying about the abuse she suffered as a child.
But when her friends rallied round Whitney, Leo resorted to spying on her by hiding in her attic.
Just before the Queen Vic boat party, he confronted his ex-girlfriend with a knife and the ensuing struggle resulted in Leo’s death.
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EastEnders viewers know Whitney is innocent but recently Leo’s mum, Michaela turned up in the Square to reveal she is determined to see justice.
Whitney felt sorry for Leo’s mum but Gray Atkins (Toby-Alexander Smith) revealed she had been helping the police and the prosecution build a case against her.
In the latest scenes, Michaela held a knife to Whitney after being released by the police following her arrest for harassing Whitney on social media.
Express.co.uk spoke to Andrew Gilmore, Head of Criminal Law at Grosvenor Law to determine how Michaela could impact Whitney’s chance of being found innocent.
“Whitney’s legal team would obviously seek to support her case by calling any evidence she could to show that she had acted with reasonable force,” he continued.
“It would be likely that the defence lawyers would want the jury to hear any evidence of Leo’s past stalking and the history of the case.
“This would help to establish that Whitney was in fear of her personal safety at the time of the murder.”
He added: “Ultimately, it would be for the jury to decide whether Whitney thought she was in danger or about to be attacked by Leo, and if so, it would then be for them to assess whether the force used was reasonable and proportionate.
“The very fact Leo was in Whitney’s home with a knife would be taken into consideration by a jury and so the crime scene evidence would be looked at closely by Whitney’s defence team.”
Michaela is aware of her son’s sinister side and was locked away in the boot of a car when she tried to reason with Leo months previously.
However, she is now intent on seeing Whitney go to jail for her son’s murder and blames her for his downfall.
Would the jury believe Michaela or will the troubled market trader finally be able to put her past behind her?
EastEnders continues Monday on BBC One at 8pm.