Father says affair was not trigger for killing

A WEALTHY antiques dealer told police he was trapped in an affair with a married lover but denied it was the trigger for strangling his seven-year-old daughter.

Robert Peters, 56, throttled Sophia with a dressing-gown cord at the family home in Wimbledon then called 999 to report it, the Old Bailey heard.

In a video police interview played at the trial, Peters told of a two-and-a-half-year affair with a married Home Office official.

Six months before, Peters said he had left the family home but moved back home after the affair ended. “The other party, she ended it. She had a hold over me. I tried to end the relationship a number of times but she could not let me go,” he said.

His wife Krittiya had found out about it a year ago. He added: “She forgave me, sort of, asking me questions. But that was not the real pressure. The pressure was that I was going bankrupt and unable to cope.”

He said he had been depressed and had tried to commit suicide three times, once 20 years ago and twice more in 2017.

Peters said he decided to kill Sophia on November 3 last year before she was due to return to her £5,000-a-term boarding school.

Asked if Sophie was a good child, Peters said: “Yeah. She was fine. She was not good at school. Partly just her ability.”

Asked if her school fees were an annoyance, he said it was “everything – the whole scenario of my debt”. He told police he was “too tormented with my life” and “could not bear going on”.

Peters said his plan was to kill his wife and family, saying: “I would have wanted to do away with all of them but couldn’t.”

Asked why he did not just kill himself, he said: “I can’t explain.”

Peters has admitted the manslaughter of Sophia but denies murder. The trial continues.