Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Son hopes to meet up with murder plot dad
THE estranged son of an army sergeant who tried to kill his wife by staging a skydiving “accident” says he wants to reconnect with his criminal dad.
Trevor Thompsett, now 21, says he has met Emile Cilliers just once since he was a young boy – but is now desperate to question him about his past.
Cilliers was found guilty four years ago of trying to murder wife Victoria Cilliers.
His trial was told he wanted to kill her to access her life insurance policy – money he could then use to start a new life with a lover.
He tampered with Victoria’s parachute ahead of a skydive he had booked for her at an airfield in Netheravon near Salisbury in 2015.
But she miraculously survived the 4,000ft fall and Cilliers was found guilty after two trials on two counts of attempted murder.
He was also found to have tried to kill Victoria by tampering with the gas supply at their home in Amesbury.
But, despite his father’s dark past, Trevor says he wants to speak to him again – as he has “so many questions”.
Now living in Kettering, Northamptonshire, Trevor said: “When you find out your biological dad has done something like that, it is a really shocking feeling.
“I want to reach out because I never knew him properly, and I have so many questions for him about why he left my mum.”
Trevor is one of two children Cilliers had with long-time girlfriend Nicolene Shepherd at the turn of the millennium.
They lived in South Africa but the couple’s relationship went downhill after their children were born, and Trevor says his parents split up when he was three.
He says Cilliers then abandoned his family and Trevor and his older sister Cilene went to the UK in 2005 to live with their grandma – Nicolene’s mum – Anna Thompsett.
But then, ten years later when Trevor was a teenager, Cilliers contacted Anna and asked to see his children.
They met at a hotel in Wiltshire but Cilliers only stayed for an hour before rushing off with no explanation as to where he was going, Trevor said.
Trevor said: “When we found out we were going to be meeting our birth father properly for the first time in 2015, I was excited.
“I’d always wanted to meet him, but when he turned up to the hotel that day he took little to no interest in me or my sister.
“He almost ignored us completely and just spoke to our nan the entire time.
“He then suddenly left without really telling anyone where he was going.
“It was a really weird occasion and I was disappointed that he still, after all these years, didn’t seem to care about us.”
Anna, 65, said: “In 2012 I contacted Emile on Facebook saying the kids wanted to meet.
“He never replied to that message – but then he got in trouble and messaged me back three years later, saying he never saw it and it got lost in his inbox.
“He said he would like to meet the children, and we organised to meet at the Travelodge as it was half-way between where he lived and I live.
“When Emile reached out, Trevor was really excited. He had high expectations that he was finally going to have a father in his life.
“On the day, he didn’t make much of an effort with the children, he only wanted to see them because he wanted people on his side, as the case had just started.
“After that he was meant to come to Cilene’s 16th birthday, but he pulled out on the day and we never saw him again.”
A few weeks after he met Cilliers, Trevor was shocked to see his birth father on the news talking about his wife’s botched parachute jump on April 5, 2015.
But after an investigation it emerged Cilliers was the one responsible for tampering with her rig – in a plot to murder her.
He was arrested and found guilty of attempted murder three years later at Winchester crown court, and sentenced to a minimum of 18 years in prison.
I never knew him properly, and I have so many questions for him about why he left TREVOR THOMPSETT
Trevor followed the case on the news and is well aware of what his father has done, but insists he still wants to meet him to get answers as to why he left him.
Not only that, Trevor says if he was to visit Cilliers in prison and they were to successfully put aside their differences, he wouldn’t rule out allowing him into his life.
Trevor, a dad-of-one himself, said: “Obviously seeing photos of him on TV was difficult to watch and hearing about what he’d done I just couldn’t believe it.
“He’s been a terrible father to me, and I’d expect to all his other kids he has with multiple different women.
“But at the end of the day he’s still my biological dad, and I want to know why he felt it was OK to abandon me and my sister when were just toddlers.
“I don’t know what prison he is in, but if I did, I’d go and visit him because I have so many questions.
“And, if he was to give the right answers, I wouldn’t rule out building some sort of relationship with him in the future.”
Unfortunately for Cilliers, Trevor’s sister Cilene doesn’t share the same desires to meet him and said she’s glad he’s behind bars.
Cilene previously told The Mirror: “He might be my dad, but I wanted that jury to find him guilty as much as anyone else.
“His conviction was justice not only for Victoria, but for everyone who has crossed paths with him and been hurt, me included.
“For the first time, he is paying the price for his actions, but six children are growing up without their dad, and Eliana [her daughter] will never get to know her grandad.
“It would be nice for us all to know we’ve got each other, and that not everything dad did was negative.”
Anna is also happy Cilliers is locked up and believes her daughter dodged a bullet when their relationship came to an end all those years ago.
She said: “Nicolene and him were together when they were very young and at the time I never thought things would turn out the way they did.
“He is a narcissist and sociopath – but I never knew it at the time he was dating my daughter.”
Sex-obsessed Cilliers’ trial heard that he was cheating on Victoria with a Tinder lover, and was known to use prostitutes.
It was said that he was mired in debt and had plans to use his wife’s life insurance – which he believed to be £120,000 – to run away with the new woman.