Maureen Rickards stabbed Jeremy Rickards multiple times and hid his body in a bag at the bottom of their garden. She faces a minimum of 22 years in prison. Finn Macdiarmid reports.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00She googled how to kill her husband, recorded herself abusing him, stabbed him and dumped
00:05his body in their garden, and now Maureen Rickards has been sentenced to life in prison.
00:10After her husband was reported missing for six days, Maureen was arrested last summer
00:15on July 11th on suspicion of fraud after CCTV showed she had been shopping with her husband's
00:20bank card after he had been reported missing.
00:23Carpet cleaning products, stain remover and an air freshener were some of the products
00:27she bought, but she was re-arrested and charged with murder on the same day once the body
00:32was found.
00:34During a four-week trial earlier this year, Canterbury Crown Court heard that Rickards had
00:38extensively cleaned her house to cover up her crime, including removing all his belongings
00:42like his passport, clothing and wedding ring and even creating a false narrative about
00:47her husband's whereabouts.
00:48She sent WhatsApp messages to herself and their daughter from his phone, suggesting he was
00:52working in Saudi Arabia, and when she began to accuse their daughter of causing her father's
00:57death, she reported him missing to police.
01:00Officers investigating his disappearance went to Rickards accommodation and said her room
01:04smelt of death and found the body at the bottom of the garden, tucked away under overgrown
01:08plants and buried under a mound of grass cuttings.
01:12The court heard how Maureen had filmed herself physically hurting and threatening to kill her
01:16husband, and revealed she had even Googled how to do so, with one of these videos lasting
01:20as long as 15 minutes.
01:23During the trial, Maureen was quoted as saying good riddance to bad rubbish, but said she had
01:28neither beaten nor stabbed her husband.
01:30In the end, she was found guilty with a unanimous verdict and will have to serve 22 years in
01:35prison before her release could be considered by the parole board.
01:39Finn McDermott for KMTV.