Tragic diary of torment with killer husband
MURDERED British mother Caroline Crouch documented the breakdown of the relationship with her killer husband.
In a series of diary entries, revealed by police after Babis Anagnostopoulos’ shock confession, tragic Caroline wrote: “I love him so much that I can’t leave him even though this relationship hurts me.”
Onthursday, after an eighthour interrogation, Uk-trained helicopter pilot Anagnostopoulos, 33, confessed to smothering the 20-year-old to death at their home in Athens on May 11.
He then staged a violent burglary he said was carried out by a gang of armed raiders.
He left his baby daughter Lydia by Caroline’s body, killed their pet husky puppy before blindfolding and tying himself up then alerting police.
Anagnostopoulos spent the weeks since the murder appealing for help to catch her “killers”, before he was arrested after being flown to Athens by police helicopter on Wednesday.
He had been on the island of Alonissos, where Caroline’s parents live, at a memorial service, where he was snapped hugging the victim’s mother.
Before the confession Anagnostopoulos was shown the results of examinations of mobile devices, a smartwatch and cameras revealing inconsistencies in his account. Police said on the night of her death, Caroline messaged a friend saying she was leaving her husband and had tried to book a hotel room.
Crucially, a fitness tracker on the smartwatch showed her heart had stopped hours before the alleged break-in. It has emerged that Greek police already had suspicions about him after obtaining Caroline’s diary which showed there had been an explosive and toxic relationship since before Lydia was born.
In 2019, while pregnant, Caroline wrote: “Last night we fought because I had a meltdown because of my hormones. I yelled at him and hit him and told him I don’t want our baby... I am not well, I am very upset, I know he would never hurt my baby.”
Around 10 months before the murder she described wanting to leave her husband. On July 3, last year, she wrote: “Today my little one is a month old – it’s also the day I told Babi I want to leave... I feel awful.”
She also admitted she wanted to leave before she got pregnant but changed her mind, saying: “I didn’t want my daughter to grow up without her parents.”
Anagnostopoulos told police he killed the couple’s dog to make the robbery ruse more plausible because “no one would have thought that I could harm a dog”, Greek media reports.
In the confession, he said he killed her during an argument and lied about the robbery because he did not want their daughter to grow up alone.
He appeared in court on Friday handcuffed and wearing a bulletproof vest, charged with intentional homicide and abuse of an animal.