A WIFE was found cradling her dead husband on the M60 at Whitefield after her attempts to "teach him a lesson" during a drive home ended in catastrophe.

Terry Mangan, who had a daughter from a previous relationship, fell from the bonnet of his car when Joanne, his wife of two years, began to drive away from him following a heated bust-up on September 26.

Mr Mangan suffered a head wound when he fell back into the carriageway and further massive injuries when struck by a passing heavy goods vehicle.

An inquest in Bury on Friday (March 2) heard how Mrs Mangan had initially accepted responsibility for the fatality. At the scene she told two men, one a police officer: "I have killed my husband" after he "climbed" on to the bonnet of their car.

However, in four subsequent interviews with police she said that her 38-year-old husband lay across the windscreen and bonnet "for only a few seconds" before he slid off into the first lane of the M60. Medical evidence later suggested that Liverpudlian Mr Mangan suffered a head injury before he was killed instantly by the lorry.

In a statement Mrs Mangan told police that she was repeatedly punched in the face by her husband as they made their way home to Liverpool following a night out with friends in the Middleton area.

She said: "To avoid further blows, I jumped into the back of the car and Terry pulled over. He intended to throw me out of the vehicle.

"As he got out of the car, I locked the doors and got into the driver's seat. Terry leaned across the bonnet as I began to move off but he was only there for a few seconds.

"I wanted to teach him a lesson that I was prepared to go home and leave him stranded on the motorway."

Mrs Mangan (31), from the Huyton area of Liverpool, stopped the car 200 yards further along the M60 and raced back to her husband, who had been crushed by the lorry.

Recording an open verdict, coroner Mr Barrie Williams said he was not surprised that police later charged Mrs Mangan with unlawfully killing her husband and driving with excess alcohol, she was just over the legal drink-drive limit, although the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to indict due to the mother-of-two's full account of the incident.

He said: "There was insufficient evidence to record a verdict of unlawful killing. But I cannot accept that in driving off as she did, notwithstanding the fears for her safety, in order to teach him a lesson, that the following events could be so unforeseen and unexpected to justify a verdict of accidental death."