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Husband guilty of roof box murder | Husband guilty of roof box murder |
(20 minutes later) | |
A man has been found guilty of murdering his wife and hiding her body in a car roof top box. | A man has been found guilty of murdering his wife and hiding her body in a car roof top box. |
A jury at Lewes Crown Court took less than two hours to convict Andre Genestin, 48, of Maresfield Road, Brighton of murder. | A jury at Lewes Crown Court took less than two hours to convict Andre Genestin, 48, of Maresfield Road, Brighton of murder. |
Genestin used a mallet to crush the skull of 38-year-old Catherine as she sat on their lounge sofa, then hid her body in a roof box in their garden. | |
Mrs Genestin's decomposed remains were found by police officers in June 2007. | Mrs Genestin's decomposed remains were found by police officers in June 2007. |
In the weeks after the murder, which happened some time between 11 and 14 May 2007, French national Genestin carried on life as normal. | In the weeks after the murder, which happened some time between 11 and 14 May 2007, French national Genestin carried on life as normal. |
Judge Anthony Scott Gall, sitting at Lewes Crown Court, said unemployed Genestin had been convicted on the "most compelling evidence". | Judge Anthony Scott Gall, sitting at Lewes Crown Court, said unemployed Genestin had been convicted on the "most compelling evidence". |
Affair confrontation | |
During the two-week trial, jurors heard it was only after the couple's young daughter repeatedly raised her concerns about her mother's disappearance with her teachers that social services and the police investigated. | |
Police officers drawn to a strong smell from the car roof box in the back garden of the couple's home found the decomposed remains of Russian-born Mrs Genestin. | |
Examination of Genestin's computer after he was arrested showed he had been composing a letter to the British consulate in Kiev stating he would be sponsoring a woman called Tatyana to come to the UK. | |
The court heard that Mrs Genestin had confronted her husband about his affair with Tatyana and he had urged her to consider allowing his mistress to move in with them. | |
Genestin could have killed his wife because she would have been in a position to blackmail him if they were to separate because of what she knew about his dubious business dealings, prosecutors said. | |
'Hysterical wife' | |
Genestin had denied murder but admitted manslaughter by reason of provocation. | |
In evidence, he said there was "only so much hysteria a man can take". | |
He said: "I have to protect my daughter and myself. I have a high threshold in coping with emotional pressure. I think your average man would have cracked before I did." | |
Genestin said he did not call police after he killed his wife because "I wanted to save my own skin". | |
The judge said he faced a sentence of life imprisonment but the minimum term had yet to be determined. |