I’ve been a very naughty boy
Confession of Ukip ex-Marine facing life for killing wife in row over affair
A FORMER Ukip councillor who confessed he ‘had been a naughty boy’ was facing life in jail last night for the murder of his wife.
As wife Anne lay dead in their home, Stephen Searle told a 999 call handler ‘I’ve... er... just killed my wife’ before adding he ‘had been a naughty boy’ after choking her to death last December.
The call handler then inquired: ‘Are there just the two of you in the house?’, to which he replied: ‘Well, just the one of us now.’
When police arrived, ex-Marine Searle, 64, greeted them by saying ‘Ah, hello buddies’ before telling them he had acted in selfdefence, claiming Mrs Searle had ‘attacked him with a knife’ in a row over his affair with their son’s girlfriend. Asked how he killed her, Searle said: ‘Suffocation really. Bit of a bizarre situation, but never mind.’
A jury found the ex-commando and Ukip parliamentary candidate guilty of murdering his 62- year- old wife after just three- and- a- half hours of deliberation yesterday.
Prosecutor Andrew Jackson said Searle had a four-month fling with Anastasia Pomiateeva, 39, the partner of son Gary. She had been with Gary Searle for eight years and was effectively a daughter-in-law to the defendant.
The affair began last April, while Searle was a Ukip county councillor for Stowmarket South in Suffolk. He went on to contest the Central Suffolk and North Ipswich constituency
‘Too old to start again’
at the June 2017 general election, but came last.
Ipswich Crown Court heard the affair ended two months later, after his wife read intimate text messages between the pair. But Mrs Searle later told work colleagues at a sushi manufacturing company that she did not want to end their 45-year marriage because she was ‘too old to start again’.
Searle killed his wife on the night of December 30 last year after ‘yet another row’ about his fling, the prosecutor said. He used a choke hold he was taught in the Royal Marines, jurors were told.
The court heard it would have taken only eight to 15 seconds for Mrs Searle to become unconscious if she had her airflow constricted. But Searle would have had to continue suffocating her for up to several minutes to kill her.
Searle claimed he had accidentally killed his wife when he grabbed her by the throat after she tried to stab him. He was convicted yesterday at the end of a six-day trial and faces a life sentence at a hearing today.