Police charge man over fatal Bristol stabbing

LONDON, June 2 (Reuters) Detectives have charged a 30-year-old Bristol man with the murder of a father of three who was stabbed to death in Bristol after a ''petty squabble'', police said today.

Keith Paul Hunt was charged in connection with the fatal knifing on 29-year-old Barry Wilson on Tuesday.

Wilson's murder as he walked home from an anti-crime day organised by police and councillors was the latest of a series of high-profile fatal stabbings which have fuelled public fears.

Avon and Somerset police said Hunt will appear before magistrates later today.

Wilson, whose partner Maxine Prescott is pregnant with their fourth child, died in hospital after he was stabbed in the neck and heart.

Police said he had become embroiled in a minor dispute as he walked down his road with another man at about 4.30 p.m.

Detective Chief Inspector Guy Vickers has characterised the dispute as a ''petty squabble''.

An intensive police search near to the site of the killing revealed a number of knives in the area and forensic experts are trying to establish if one of them was the murder weapon.

The incident was just one of a slew of knife attacks to have made front page news and comes during a knife amnesty and calls for tougher sentences for those caught carrying blades.

On Wednesday, a 19-year-old assistant was stabbed after an altercation with three men at a shop in north London and is in ''critical condition'' in hospital.

On Monday, a 17-year-old was stabbed, also in Bristol, while in Nottingham 26-year-old Ian Montgomery was knifed outside a bar in the city centre after going to the aid of a woman who was being assaulted.

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