£101m EuroMillions couple tied up during violent raid on home
A COUPLE who won £101million on the lottery were tied up and robbed in a horrific raid at their luxury home.
David and Angela Dawes scooped the EuroMillions jackpot in 2011 to become the UK’s seventhbiggest winners.
But their massive prize made them a target at their mansion, which was once owned by Sir Tom Jones and Engelbert Humperdinck.
Details of the sickening raid in Etchingham, East Sussex, emerged yesterday.
David, 56, was smashed in the face and both he and his 52-yearold wife Angela were bound using cable ties.
The gang made off with jewellery and £20,000 in cash in the couple’s exclusive Range Rover. The vehicle was later found burnt out nearby after the raid in April last year.
Windfall
The frightening episode had remained a secret. But the smash and grab raid was made public after the pair made a retrospective planning application to beef up security.
Seven CCTV columns have since been put up at the property, according to papers submitted to Rother District Council.
They each contain thermal imaging equipment – like technology used at the Eurotunnel terminals in Folkestone and Calais – and speakers to scare off intruders.
David and Angela initially used some of their windfall to buy a £4.5million flat in Fulham, west London, close to his beloved Chelsea Football Club’s Stamford Bridge stadium.
But six years later they swapped London for the countryside where neighbours includeTheWho’s Roger Daltrey. Three men were arrested following the burglary but were released without charge and told they would face no further action.
The spectacular win transformed Mr Dawes overnight from an industrious factory worker to a multi-millionaire who need never work again.
But in 2017 the couple were forced to go to court when his son – Afghanistan veteran Michael, 32 –
David and Angela Dawes after their £101million win. Right, the couple’s East Sussex mansion which boasts a large swimming pool, above
accused his father of being “ungenerous in spirit” after he cut him out of a will.
Judge Nigel Gerald ruled the father did not need to keep bailing out his son, who splashed £1.6million in two years, and came back for more – failing to heed his stepmother’s advice to stop eating at the Ritz and go to McDonald’s instead. The court heard Michael and his civil partner had not repaid the lotto winners’ generosity with gratitude and appeared to have “developed a sense of entitlement”.
Tensions between Michael and Angela came to a head at her birthday party in November 2013 when he turned up without a gift.
Asked why he failed to bring one, he said he bought flowers instead as he knew she loved them. And he told the court: “What do you give someone who has everything?” Tempers flared during the party and father and son rowed about money.
Judge Gerald comprehensively dismissed Michael’s claim, ruling: “There was no basis on which any rational or normal human being could conclude that they could go back for more money whenever they wanted.”