Jailed, bullying pilot who drove fiancee to kill son aged one
A CHEATING airline captain was jailed yesterday after subjecting his fiancée to a campaign of abuse that drove her to break down and kill their one-year-old son.
Peter Chilvers, 33, repeatedly belittled Magda Lesicka and warned her he would win custody of their boy if she left him.
It reached crisis point when she learnt the Ryanair pilot was continuing to pursue a barely-concealed affair with stewardess colleague Lisa Spencer. But when Polish-born Lesicka tried to end their relationship, Chilvers launched into a rant.
He shouted: ‘I will be living with my son... fight me on this, you won’t win, you haven’t got the resources, you haven’t got the support. If you walk out, you walk out on your own.’
Tragically, Lesicka, 33, snapped and repeatedly stabbed James, 23 months, in the chest that evening.
She then slit her throat and tried to hang herself. Chilvers arrived from piloting a holiday jet back from Tenerife – only for a bleeding Lesicka to fall into his arms when he opened the front door.
In a heartbreaking case that could not be reported until today, the ex-stewardess was last year jailed for 15 years after admitting James’s manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
His grandparents described the ‘excepsecretly tionally bright’ little boy as ‘adorable, beautiful, inquisitive and loving’, saying he had recognised the spelling of his name for the first time on the morning of his killing on August 26, 2017.
Lesicka’s sentencing hearing was told her breakdown had been ‘ induced’ by the ‘deliberate, relentless and ultimately overwhelming psychological torment’ to which she was subjected.
Chilvers – who moved in with Miss Spencer after the killing and now has two young daughters with her – later stood trial over his abuse. Yesterday he was jailed for 18 months after being convicted of coercive or controlling behaviour.
He was cleared of two counts of rape and one of assault by penetration. A statement written by Lesicka was read to Manchester Crown Court in which she branded Chilvers a ‘controlling monster’.
‘It is important that the public understand what Peter Chilvers’s abuse did to me,’ she said. ‘ It destroyed me. I tried to leave but he wouldn’t let me. I had no power.’ Sentencing Chilvers yesterday, Judge Patrick Field QC called him a ‘selfish, entitled bully’ who had shown ‘no more than a hint’ of remorse. He told Chilvers
‘Helped himself to her body’ ‘A landscape of unending misery’
he had treated Lesicka as his ‘sexual property’ and that she felt she had no choice but to let him ‘help yourself to her body’.
Dressed in a suit and tie, Chilvers showed no emotion as he was sentenced, but his mother Hilary, a retired teacher, broke down.
His trial heard how Lesicka suffered years of psychological torment with Chilvers threatening to kill her if she ever left with James.
Chilvers downloaded an app on his mobile phone enabling him to record calls – an apparent attempt to gather evidence for future custody proceedings.
Recordings of his bullying calls to Lesicka on the day she killed their son were played to the jury in his trial.
In the words of her barrister at her sentencing, they portrayed a ‘landscape of unending misery if she did not comply with his demands’. After his rant, Lesicka called police saying she wanted to withdraw a complaint she had finally plucked up the courage to make against him. But she was told it was too late and he would have to be questioned over her claims. That night, Lesicka ‘ cracked after months of resistance’ and stabbed James to death in a bedroom of their home in Wythenshawe, Manchester. Chilvers was acquitted of causing actual bodily harm over an incident in which Lesicka claimed he pinned her to the floor. But he was convicted of an alternative offence of common assault.
Mark Ford QC, defending, argued for a suspended sentence, saying Chilvers now has two young daughters with Miss Spencer and jailing him would be a ‘significant threat’ to his mental health. ‘Just a few years ago Peter Chilvers had the world at his feet,’ he added.
The offence of coercive control has been a crime since 2015 and includes psychological abuse and intimidation.
Detective Chief Inspector Richard Eales said: ‘If people take anything away from this heartbreaking case, please let it be that there is support and help available for those suffering domestic abuse.’