Sleep Scientist recalls harrowing incident of a man who drove 23km and killed his mother-in-law while sleepwalking

A sleep scientist shares a harrowing incident where a man drove to his parent-in-law’s home and bludgeoned his mother-in-law to death while he was sleepwalking.

Sleep expert Professor Guy Leschziner revealed that the man was acquitted of murder in court after being found to have committed the act in his sleep.

Leschziner, who is a world-renowned expert in Neurology and Sleep Medicine at Guy’s Hospital London sat down with Steven Bartlett for an episode of his podcast, Diary of a CEO.

In the interview, Leschziner revealed that there have been cases where people have been found not guilty for crimes they’ve committed in their sleep.

Although he said that there is “always a degree of uncertainty as to whether or not a particular event happened in sleep”.

The expert shared that there are certain patterns of behaviour that an individual might exhibit which will demonstrate that they were asleep.

One famous case that is mentioned by the sleep scientist, is that of Kenneth Parks, who committed murder during his sleep.

The sleep expert recalled the harrowing incident (YouTube/@TheDiaryOfACEO)

Based in Pickering, Ontario, Canada, Parks drove 23 km (14 miles) to his in-law’s house where he bludgeoned his mother-in-law to death with a tire iron from the trunk of his car.

He then tried to strangle his father-in-law before throwing him into a swimming pool.

Leschziner said: “This was made even more curious by the fact that there had been some evidence that he'd been having some financial difficulties and had had some discussions with his parents-in-law about about financial issues, but it was deemed by a court of law that this happened whilst he was sleepwalking and he was actually acquitted.”

There have been incidents where people have committed crimes in their sleep (Catherine McQueen/Getty)

While the sleep expert revealed that he has seen someone drive in their sleep before, “it seems stretching credibility that somebody could have undertaken all of that whilst sleeping but you know, in the courts of law he was found not guilty”.

He went on to say that he had a patient who had operated a motorbike while snoozing and said: “It's likely that actually the majority of the brain is probably awake because it's very hard to envisage how somebody may be able to do something quite so complicated when the majority of their brain is asleep but crucially the parts of the brain that remain asleep are the bits that are responsible for rational thinking.

“I mean why would she have gone for a motorcycle ride in the middle of the night if she was thinking rationally.”