A Ukrainian husband and wife had a raging argument the day before the wife was found dead at the bottom of a lift shaft, a court was told this morning.

Police Inspector Chris Pullicino, prosecuting, was giving testimony at the end of the compilation of evidence against Sergei Nykytiuk, who is accused of having murdered his wife Liudmyla Nykytiuk, 35, a year ago in their apartment block in Ramon Perellos Street, St Paul’s Bay.

Inspector Pullicino spoke on how he had visited the scene of the crime and found the Ukrainian woman at the bottom of the empty lift shaft. She appeared to have suffered a blow on one eye.

The argument, he said, broke out during the birthday party of the couple’s friend Roman Kovachuk.

Mr Nykytiuk had accused his wife of infidelity and called her a prostitute.

The police inspector said that a Ukrainian man he had questioned, Vitaly Pidkypnyi, admitted the relationship with Ms Nykytiuk. He had also claimed that Ms Nykytiuk was occasionally beaten by her husband.

Inspector Pullicino said the accused was claiming that his wife had fallen down the shaft by accident, but he had failed to report the incident immediately, which, he said, was a crime in itself.