Remember me
A husband who fatally stabbed his wife before chillingly manipulating their young child to evade justice is now staring down a life sentence.
Robert Rhodes, 52, from Withleigh, killed his wife Dawn in their kitchen in 2016 after learning she had been having an affair with a work colleague.
He carefully orchestrated the killing and deceived their child, who was under 10, into assisting and backing up his elaborate fabrication of events.
Following the murder, Rhodes misled police and the courts into believing he had inflicted the fatal wound to his wife in self-defence when she attacked him. The scheme succeeded, and he managed to secure an acquittal for murder at his Old Bailey trial in 2017.
However, in 2021, his child confided in a therapist, disclosing they had been coerced into supporting Rhodes' falsehoods as part of his scheme to "get rid of mummy". The father underwent a rare double jeopardy second murder trial and was convicted by a jury in December last year following the emergence of fresh evidence.
At Inner London Crown Court on Friday, January 16, Rhodes will receive a life sentence when Mrs Justice Ellenbogen passes judgment, according to PA. Alongside the murder conviction, Rhodes was also found guilty of two counts of perjury for providing false evidence at his Old Bailey trial and in the Family Courts in 2018, perverting the course of justice, and child cruelty.
Rhodes murdered his wife on 2 June 2016, following a divorce filing. The child, who cannot be named due to legal reasons, made a 999 call at 7.34pm during which Rhodes claimed his wife had assaulted him and their child with a knife.
Dawn Rhodes was discovered with her throat slit on the kitchen floor of their Redhill, Surrey home. Immediately, Rhodes began spinning a false narrative, telling officers that his wife had struck him twice on the back of the head.
In his initial trial, he described her as attacking him after "flipping like a Hulk".
In an attempt to lend credibility to his story, the father inflicted a stab wound on himself and a cut on the child's arm – injuries he attributed to his wife. The alleged murderer believed he had escaped justice when a jury acquitted him in 2017.
However, the truth started to unravel when the child confided in a therapist about being manipulated and subsequently approached the police. Rhodes had involved the young one in his plot, coaching them to corroborate his version of events.
Upon his second arrest for the murder, he ominously told officers he had "thought this would come back to bite me". His previous acquittal on the murder charge was overturned in the Court of Appeal, and the Crown Prosecution Service received permission from senior judges to bring the case to a second trial.
The child's testimony has been crucial to the new case. They disclosed that Rhodes had kept in touch while on bail in 2016 and 2017, instructing them to adhere to the plan.
The father continued to manipulate his child, including concealing a mobile phone at his mother's residence on which he would leave messages reminding the youngster about their agreement. The child had been told to instruct Dawn Rhodes to close her eyes and wait to receive a picture.
As they departed the room, Rhodes then attacked his wife with a knife whilst she stood with her eyes shut, oblivious to the imminent assault. "The new evidence that came from the child witness was profoundly shocking and showed just how much careful planning Robert Rhodes had put into murdering his wife", said Libby Clark, from the CPS.
"He exploited a young child before the murder, explaining his plan to cover up the truth and make it appear as if Dawn had attacked him, so that he could claim that he acted in self-defence. This included Rhodes inflicting injuries on the young child's arm.
"He continued with his web of lies over the intervening years. It is thanks to the immense bravery of the child in coming forward to explain exactly what happened that night that Robert Rhodes has finally been brought to justice for the murder of Dawn, something he mistakenly thought he could get away with.
"None of us can even begin to imagine what Rhodes has put the child through over a period of many years. Now though, as a result of their evidence, Dawn can now be remembered by everyone in the right way – as a victim of her violent partner."
Detective Chief Inspector Kimball Edey, from the Surrey and Sussex Police major crime team, said: "During the first trial, Dawn was portrayed as the villain but had actually been a victim of domestic abuse and coercive control at the hands of her husband for years.
"The fact that Rhodes not only murdered his wife in cold blood but then manipulated and groomed his own child to play a part in his evil scheme and cover up what he had done is simply despicable – not only did he take a life; he irreparably damaged another, as well as the lives of everyone else who loved Dawn."
The Devon man contested all charges brought against him during his second trial. On Friday, Rhodes will receive an automatic life sentence for murder, with the judge set to determine the minimum term he must serve before becoming eligible for release on licence.