A WOMAN killed by her 13-year-old foster child was a kind and caring person who had an affinity with children, her husband has told an inquiry.

Dawn McKenzie, 34, was stabbed by the teenager she and her husband Bryan were looking after at their home in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, in 2011.

A Fatal Accident Inquiry into the circumstances of her death heard that Mrs McKenzie decided to look into becoming a foster carer after years working as a nursery nurse.

Mr McKenzie, 40, told the inquiry in Motherwell, North Lanarkshire: "She was a very sweet, kind girl, very caring.

"She was a strong person as well, very determined and very hard-working."

The couple, who did not have children of their own, began looking into fostering in 2010 after Mrs McKenzie saw a newspaper advert and told her husband it was something she was interested in.

They made inquiries with Foster Care Associates and undertook a training course and assessments, the inquiry before Sheriff David Bicket at the GLO Centre was told.

The boy was detained for seven years after admitting culpable homicide on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Day one of the inquiry heard that the McKenzies lived in a two-bedroom flat in Hamilton and had been married for almost 11 years when Mrs McKenzie was killed on June 24 2011.

She had previously worked at a private nursery in East Kilbride and had been promoted to deputy manager before applying to become a foster carer.

Procurator Fiscal depute Carrie Macfarlane showed the inquiry documents relating to the application, training and vetting process.

A feedback form from a training course stated that Mrs McKenzie showed "excellent knowledge and understanding" and a reference from her employer described her as an "excellent child practitioner".

The inquiry heard that the couple were keen to foster one or two children up to 16 years of age.

Ms Macfarlane asked Mr McKenzie about a reference in the documents to the appropriate storage of kitchenware and where they kept their kitchen knives.

He said they were stored in a drawer with a child-proof lock on it.

Mr McKenzie said they had been left "high and dry" by the social work department in the first weeks of the boy's placement.

He said they were initially delighted to have been approved as foster carers in October 2010 and within weeks they were asked to take the boy as their first placement.

However, the inquiry heard that the transition was handled badly due to the haste with which his previous placement ended, travel chaos caused by 2010's severe winter weather and the boy's social worker going on annual leave.

The boy was previously placed with his two sisters but this ended abruptly after the carer's father became ill, and he was separated from his sisters and sent to live with the McKenzies.

A note from the boy's supervision record, read out at the inquiry, stated: "Dawn and Bryan had just been approved as carers and have taken (the boy) as placement at short notice.

"Due to the ending of his placement with another FCA carer the decision to move (the boy) was taken with such expediency due to the other carer's circumstances, and therefore was not managed as well as it could have been with little planning or preparation for (the boy)."

Mr McKenzie said they were not made aware of the full extent of the boy's background until the end of January 2011, more than two months after the placement started.

It emerged that when he had been taken into care he had been sleeping on a trampoline, had no shoes and was living in a house frequented by drug addicts.

He had previously been subjected to "frequent acts of violence" including "smashing his head off units", Mr McKenzie said.

When the placement began, the boy would eat like "every bite was his last", gorging on sweets and refusing to share.

He would also frequently wet the bed but Mr McKenzie said this appeared to be an act of defiance "if he didn't get his own way", and they would often find the boy in dry pyjamas but with wet bedsheets.

He was in frequent trouble at school, including an incident where the boy claimed he and another boy "sorted out" someone who had been annoying him.

However, he showed signs of improvement including some merits at school, reading his first book and winning man of the match at football.

He was still allowed supervised contact with his mother but Mr McKenzie said this contact was "poorly managed" by social workers and the boy returned from visits in a low mood that would last for days.

It later emerged that he had been holding clandestine conversations with his family on Facebook and a social network gaming platform.

Mrs McKenzie found out about the unsupervised contact when the boy questioned her about a birthday card from a relative which he had not received, revealing that his mother had told him about the card on Facebook.

The boy's laptop and mobile phone were confiscated but a further supervised meeting with his mother was arranged by social workers about a week before Mrs McKenzie was killed in June 2011.

Mrs McKenzie's diary for the day stated that the boy "had a difficult meeting with mum" and Mr McKenzie described the social worker's report as "nonsense".

Mr McKenzie said: "If he wasn't affected his mood must have changed by the time he got home. He came in very down and he wasn't his usual hyperactive self."

The boy became "difficult" in the last few days before the attack and was aggrieved about the confiscation of his laptop, Mr McKenzie said.

"I just remember that the last time my wife was alive he still wasn't allowed it," he said.

The inquiry continues tomorrow.