Pilot who beat wife to death jailed for 26 years

Robert Brown, 47, bludgeoned York-born millionairess Joanna to death with a claw hammer in their sprawling mock-Tudor family home as their two young children cowered in the playroom.

He then bundled her body into the boot of his car and later dumped it in a makeshift coffin in Windsor Great Park.

The brutal killing took place on October 31 last year – just days after a landmark ruling at the Supreme Court in which judges decided a “marriage contract” was binding.

Less than 10 days later, Brown and his wife, 46, were due to attend the High Court for a final hearing to resolve their own financial disputes.

A jury at Reading Crown Court yesterday acquitted him of murder but convicted him following 14 hours and 46 minutes of deliberations of obstructing a coroner from holding an inquest.

Brown, of North Street, Winkfield, Berkshire, had previously admitted manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility.

Sentencing him, Judge Mr Justice Cooke said: “You intended to kill, you intended to conceal the body and to hide the evidence.”

Brown, wearing a suit and tie, looked skywards as the sentence was passed while his wife’s relatives broke down in tears in the public gallery.

The court heard that Brown had failed to call an ambulance after the attack and then concealed the body in a plastic garden crate and buried it in a remote part of Windsor Great Park.

The judge added: “You took extensive steps to ensure that her body would never be found but when it became plain that the evidence was so strong, you directed the police to the site.”

During the eight-day trial, jurors heard Brown had been consumed by anger and resentment during his marriage. When his wife, known as Jo, filed for a divorce, it set in motion three years of protracted legal wrangling.

She was born in York in 1964, and lived in the city with her mother Diana Parkes, father Christopher Simpson and younger brother, James.

The family moved to the Isle of Man after her father’s property development business was bought by a larger building firm.

Problems in her marriage came to a head last year when Brown, who was by then living with his French girlfriend Stephanie Bellemere, 41, drove to his wife’s home to drop off their children following the half-term break.

He arrived at Tun Cottage armed with a claw hammer, and with the children out of sight in the playroom, he then hit Mrs Brown at least 14 times around the head.

Brown, a keen cross-country runner, had told the court he had “burst” with rage at his wife but could not remember how many times he hit her or explain why he attacked her.

He broke down while giving evidence during his trial, and said to the public gallery, “I’m sorry darling, I’m really sorry”, before telling Joanna’s brother: “I feel your pain James, I’m sorry.”

But after yesterday’s sentencing, Mrs Parkes described the verdict as a “gross miscarriage of justice”. She claimed she believed Brown devised a “cunning plan” to convince the jury he was suffering from an abnormality of mind which he used to manipulate the verdict.

She said Brown had “got away with murder in name only”, and added: “Jo suffered severe stress from his lies and greed over three-and-a-half years before he attacked her.”

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