Christine Rawle, 70, who works as a ‘horse whisperer’ has been convicted of murder after she knifed her husband to death at their £800,000 Devon home after he called her fat and lazy.
She stabbed Ian Rawle, 72, in the back with a knife as he was pushing a wheelbarrow of horse manure to a dung heap on August 21, 2022.p
According to DailyMail, the couple had been compared to Roald Dahl’s The Twits when she put Viagra in his tea, chilli in his pants and wiped her bottom with his ties.
How it Happened
Court heard how Mr Rawle followed his wife of 29 years for a hundred yards telling her to remove the knife (after she stabbed him), before collapsing and dying from the wound.
Rawle, who worked with horses as an animal behaviourist has since denied murdering Ian and instead claimed it was more of a self-defense.
Court Heard
Their youngest son coming in as a witness told Exeter Crown Court about his parents, saying that Ian hit Christine with a riding crop, ‘splitting her face open’.
Thomas Rawle, 38, added that Ian – whom he called ‘dad’, but was not his birth father – pushed Christine through a window at their home when he was ‘angry and salivating’.
Thomas said that Ian was also once ‘ranting and raving’ and used a fire glove to pick up a hot ash tray then threw it at him, striking his leg and leaving a severe burn.
He said Christine came into the room to protect him but Ian blocked her way and punched her in the side of her face. He said Ian screamed at him that he was ‘bone idle, lazy and an idiot’ and Christine went into a walk-in wardrobe to call the police, per the outlet.
But he said Ian pulled out the phone from the wall and they punched and kicked each other, before Ian grabbed her by the hair with Thomas ‘begging them to stop’.
‘Dick’ …. And …. ‘Fat’
Thomas said Christine called him a ‘d***’ and ‘d***head’, and said Ian called her a ‘fatty’, ‘fatso’ and ‘fat pig’ and said she was lazy, overweight and needed to diet.
Thomas said: ‘My dad was the aggressor quite frequently.’
And he also denied claims that she wiped her backside on his ties, saying ‘absolutely not’.
Thomas said life at their home was ‘quite often turbulent with arguments between mum and dad’.
However, considering that Thomas’ statements were against the deceased, one need to inquire if he’s saying the truth or he picked side already.
Court Ruling
Prosecutors believed the case was ‘as clear a case of murder as you are likely to find’, with the conclusion that Rawle attacked her husband in a ‘fit of temper’ during an argument about land at home in Braunton.
Judge James Adkin will sentence Rawle, who remains in custody, at Exeter Crown Court at 2pm on Friday.
