Romantic getaway days before wife’s death, jury hears
Andrew Stafford |
A couple whose marriage was falling apart had a disastrous romantic weekend away shortly before a woman was found dead in an apparent lawnmower accident, a murder trial has been told.
Frances Elizabeth Crawford was found beside a ride-on mower next to a retaining wall in the early hours of July 30, 2024.
Her husband Robert John Crawford is facing trial in the Brisbane Supreme Court after pleading not guilty to murder.
The former RAAF pilot allegedly strangled his wife on July 29, staged the scene with the mower and falsified a series of text messages between their phones to explain the incident as a tragic accident.
Jurors heard the couple had only just returned from a weekend in Kingscliff, NSW, in an attempt to heal their marriage.
Tensions exploded at the mention of one of many women it is agreed Crawford had an affair or liaison with.
In a series of messages shown to the jury, Mrs Crawford confronted her husband over his infidelities.
“You attract scum … all those girls to stroke your ego” Mrs Crawford wrote to her husband.
When Crawford said he wanted to help her heal, his wife responded angrily.
“All words,” she said.
“I could see in your eyes that you have no empathy. They are just cold.”
The jury was shown close-up stills from CCTV footage of the middle fingernail of her right hand.
Photos taken of Mrs Crawford’s body showed the fingernail ripped down to the quick.
But her nails appeared manicured over the weekend of July 27 and 28.
The prosecution has alleged Mrs Crawford suffered the injury to her nail while attempting to defend herself.
Barrister Saul Holt pointed to bloodstains on top of a rock wall on the couple’s Upper Lockyer property.
A trail of blood leading from the steering wheel of the mower to the lacerated head of Mrs Crawford was shown to the jury.
Mr Holt said it was evidence Mrs Crawford had been thrown from the mower and crushed, as her husband has said.
He told the jury no blood was found elsewhere on the couple’s property, despite Mrs Crawford sustaining a severe gash to her head.
“That is an incredibly important factor to consider in a trial when claims of staging are being assessed,” he said.
Mr Holt said the trail of blood between the mower and the 49-year-old’s body showed her husband had been able to free her from where she had been pinned, with the steering wheel over her neck.
Text messages showed that at 11.21pm, Mrs Crawford asked her husband, then 46, if he was going to bring the mower back under cover.
The defence contends she later attempted to bring the mower in herself while dressed in her pyjamas.
On Monday, the jury heard the pair had been in and out of counselling and on the verge of a final separation by July 2024.
Mrs Crawford kept her philandering husband under close surveillance and gave him an extensive list of boundaries and conditions to abide by if he wanted to stay in the marriage, Mr Cook told the jury.
These included regularly submitting to polygraph tests, regular church attendance and receipts for any spending over $30, including fuel and groceries.
The jury heard Crawford, now 49, was financially motivated to kill his wife.
He had planned to retire at 50 and their property was conservatively valued at $2 million.
His wife’s life insurance was valued at $860,000 and he was the sole beneficiary in her will, jurors were told.
A costly divorce settlement would have forced Crawford back to work.
The trial continues before Justice Lincoln Crowley.
AAP