Whitefish woman sentenced in stabbing death

A Whitefish woman who stabbed her husband during a heated argument last year has received a 10-year suspended prison sentence.

AnnMari Newton, 39, pleaded guilty in August to negligent homicide as part of a plea agreement in Flathead District Court. She faced up to 20 years in prison.

She was sentenced in District Court on Wednesday.

Newton stabbed her husband, Chad Newton, in the chest last November during an argument in the kitchen of their O’Brien Avenue home. Police found Chad Newton on the floor, unresponsive and bleeding from the left side of his chest.

Chad Newton was unresponsive until the end of December, when his family removed him from life support.

According to documents, AnnMari Newton told a detective she stabbed her husband accidentally when she made a stabbing motion with the knife intended to get him to back off and she did not realize he was standing so close to her.

Defense attorney Sean Hinchey said AnnMari Newton stabbed her husband in self-defense.

Witnesses told investigators that the couple had previous violent arguments and that they had been drinking “more and more.”

The couple’s two children were at home at the time of the incident. They were placed in the care of a family friend at the direction of Child Protective Services.

— Associated Press contributed to this story