A cleaner who allegedly unleashed an unprompted vicious attack on her 92-year-old employer had previously enjoyed a "good" relationship with the woman, a murder trial has been told.
Hanny Papanicolaou had been married to her husband for more than a decade when Marjorie Welsh sounded her medical alarm on January 2, 2019 from her inner western Sydney home.
Ms Welsh died six weeks later in hospital but not before telling detectives "Hanny the housekeeper" had attacked her.
The 38-year-old has pleaded not guilty to murdering her client of one year, but guilty to manslaughter on the basis of substantial impairment due to an abnormality in the mind.
Nick Papanicolaou told the NSW Supreme Court on Tuesday he had never seen his wife acting aggressively towards him, or anyone.
That day she was "suffering a little heat stress," but that was all, he said.
He said his wife's relationship with the older woman up until that point "was quite good," as she had given her Christmas gifts in the past, and brought along family members to the home.
This was "not something she did with other clients" he said.
After his wife was arrested he discovered a bottle of "anxiety pills" that he had never seen before, he said.
Mr Papanicolaou said his wife wasn't always a gambler, but by 2019 she enjoyed visiting the local club to "smoke and relax".
And while she had borrowed $200 from him on several occasions to play on the poker machines, she had always paid him back on the same day, he said.
On the morning of January 2, Papanicolaou lost $430 from poker machines in under an hour and was left with just $11 in her bank account, prosecutor Christopher Taylor told the jury.
At about 10.15am she jumped Ms Welsh's back fence and began beating the older woman with her own walking sticks, hurled blue and white china down upon her, and used a kitchen knife to stab her six times, Mr Taylor said.
She has disputed her employer's version of events, saying Ms Welsh accused her of stealing $50 before she was attacked.
Papanicolaou was 23 when she met her husband, 20-years her senior while working in Indonesia.
The pair relocated to Australia and married in 2008, and Papanicolaou would often send money back home in support of her parents, he said.
On January 2 he helped police locate his wife at Riverwood Park, and was asked about a text message in which she said she would "never ever" take his mother's money.
Mr Papanicolaou's mother suffered from dementia, and would often forget about the money she had spent, he said.
The trial continues.
