Sergeant ‘loosened gas valve with pliers to try to murder wife’
A SET of pliers belonging to an Army sergeant accused of trying to murder his Scots wife was used to create a gas leak at his home by loosening a nut, a court heard.
Emile Cilliers of the Royal Army Physical Training Corps is accused of attempting to kill his wife, Victoria Cilliers, by tampering with her parachute.
But yesterday a court heard that a few days earlier, 37-yearold Cilliers had tampered with the gas fitting in a kitchen cupboard at the home he shared with his wife in Amesbury, Wiltshire, for which he faces a second charge of attempted murder.
The trial at Winchester Crown Court has heard that Mrs Cilliers, 40, from Haddington, East Lothian, reported smelling gas at the property on March 30, 2015. Her husband had spent the previous night at his barracks because he said he wanted to avoid the Monday morning traffic.
An engineer called to the property found a loose nut on a gas isolation valve in a cupboard next to the oven. The court has heard that dried blood found on the pipe was a match for Cilliers. Forensic scientist Mark Kearsley told the court that he had carried out a microscopic examination of the nut and a set of mole-grip adjustable locking pliers owned by the sergeant.
Cilliers has said he used the pliers to try to tighten the nut when he had returned home before the gas engineer arrived, but could not do so because it was too tight.
Mr Kearsley said impressions left on the nut were a ‘conclusive’ match for the markings of the pliers but they had been used in a ‘loosening and not tightening motion’. He added that a ‘significant’ degree of force was used.
Gas engineer Michael Osborne said he was called to the Cilliers’ home on March 30 to make the gas leak safe.
He pinpointed the ‘small leak’ to a nut on a gas fitting in a cupboard next to the oven in the kitchen and he was able to fix it by tightening the nut by a ‘quarter-turn maximum’.
He said it was not unusual to find such a leak and explained that as well as a tool, the nut could have become loosened or ‘relaxed’ by repeated changes in temperature or by being knocked by food tins being placed in the cupboard.
Gas safety consultant Howard Reed said he inspected the property and found the valve was not faulty.
Cilliers denies two counts of attempted murder and one of damaging the gas valve, recklessly endangering life.
‘Significant degree of force used’