Pam thanks for the link to the Hull paper (above) about why it was manslaughter. I still don’t get why it wasn’t murder. but hopefully a lawyer can explain.
The perpetrator was not up for (quoting from that Hull newspaper):
Voluntary manslaughter – whereby the defendant is found to have had the intent to kill or cause serious bodily harm to the victim.
Instead He DID get:
Involuntary manslaughter – the defendant is found to be responsible for the offence of murder, but there is no clear motive for the act.
...NO CLEAR MOTIVE? what, apart from that he was into the sexual torture of drunk and high women that he had only just met?
According the Hull newspaper ‘In this case it was clear Gaskell did not intend to kill Laura which put him in the category of involuntary manslaughter’.
How is her consent (even to just sex) so ‘clear’?
The article goes on to say:
‘Gaskell does have previous convictions for violence but nothing so serious as this offence.’^ so he has a history of violence- was that all accidental too? Or perhaps he wasn’t having sex with those victims at the same time so with those he was actually, you know, properly culpable for those crimes. But that history is judged to be irrelevant because this time he is having sex with a ‘consenting woman’ when the death, er, occurs. Fucktrance again.
This is the most depressing part: ‘Perhaps most crucially, Gaskell pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity which means he received a mandatory third off his sentence. This means he would have been jailed for nine years which is at the top end of a typical sentence for manslaughter but with the third off it was reduced to six years.
So he knew the law. But so what? He couldn’t deny it. What else was he going to say because he clearly WAS the killer.
So what he did his best to paint himself as a contrite but considerate man who uses ‘safe words’ 
, painting himself as victim of a tragic accident who has to live with the consequences. It’s sickening.
www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/laura-huteson-death-killer-stabbed-13060800
The daily Mirror reports that:
‘The court heard Gaskell kept the knife under his pillow, and had a history of "taking risks" [yes - RISKS WITH HIS PARTNERS’ LIVES.. HE JUST HADN’T QUITE KILLED ONE YET] during sex and jeopardising the safety of his partners with “bizarre and violent sado-masochistic sexual activity”.
“Mild to moderate force” was needed to inflict the injury, and marks found on Ms Huteson's neck were “consistent with rough sex”.
OK wait so acceptable ‘ROUGH SEX’ now legitimately covers being strangled to the point where you think the man is not going to stop? Just no.
The Mirror continues:
‘The sex was consensual and Gaskell has “no recollection of the safe word being used” when he killed Ms Huteson, the court heard.’
The sex might have been consensual but the throat cutting clearly could not have been. I.e the bullshit fucktrance defence. He didn’t remember hearing her say stop. Why is that even relevant? He needed to be told not to kill a woman? Wouldn’t that mean the intent WAS killing?
If any of us had a knife at our throat and realised the man was likely to use it to cut, stab or slash us, we might well not be able to remember what the fucking ‘safe word’ is* or be able to utter it anyway.
Whether for shock, fear, being drunk, high and out of it, (all indicating lack of consent) or perhaps you know, just the significant pressure of a knife on our throat, or the combination of all three might take our opportunity to er, speak up clearly?
That doesn’t mean we are consenting to have our throats cut too because we have consent to sex. That doesn’t mean the bigger stronger person fucking us while holding a knife in the exact right place to kill us NEEDS A VERBAL REMINDER FROM US not to actually KILL US.
Women are not responsible for stopping men from KILLING THEM. Nobody can legally consent to another person killing them.
The whole ‘Safe Word’ thing sounds highly dubious and part of an impression being weaved for the court by the defence that this is a consenting relationship in which he ‘loved’ her etc.
The pair had just met, they’d been drinking and taking cocaine, he’d previously that evening strangled her during sex to the point that the victim told her friend that the victim ‘thought he wouldn’t stop’- so not at all how safe words work.
That IS how men who get off sexually on playing with women’s lives work though.
I find this so appalling. his insultingly low sentence (that is not for murder) seems to revolve around that she can’t speak because she’s dead.
In court it seems to have been accepted that because she didn’t use the safe word (or he didn’t ‘recall’ that she did ) then it was kind of understandable that he just went ahead and with ‘force’ cut her throat.
I just don’t understand how that’s acceptable. 
or manslaughter really.