Man Who Manipulated Child After Killing Wife Gets Longer Prison Sentence

(Robert Rhodes. Photo Credit: BBC News)

A man who k!lled his wife and manipulated their child into helping cover it up has had his sentence increased.

Robert Rhodes cut wife Dawn’s throat in their Surrey family home in 2016, but he was acquitted of murder in 2017 after claiming she had tried to att@ck him.

He was retried in December 2025 and handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 29-and-a-half years in January, after their child gave new evidence.

The sentence was referred to the Court of Appeal by the Solicitor General for being “unduly lenient,” and has since been increased by four years, to 33 years and six months.

Prosecutors argued that Rhodes, appearing via video link, had carried out a “very sustained and significant covering up for many years,” and that the starting point for the murder sentence should have been higher.

The Unduly Lenient Sentence (ULS) scheme allows crown court sentences to be reviewed where there is reason to believe the original sentence was too low.

In the ruling, the judges agreed that the sentence was unduly lenient, describing the murder as “truly appalling” and adding that they found it hard to conceive of a more heinous plot.

The court further stated that Rhodes’ “callous, selfish manipulation” of the child was a particularly abhorrent aspect of the case, noting that while Rhodes “thoroughly warranted a long minimum term,” certain aspects of the case should have further aggravated the sentence.

The retrial at Inner London Crown Court in December heard how Rhodes plotted the m*rder for months and deceived his child into helping him carry out the att@ck.

Rhodes k!lled his wife in the kitchen of their home near Redhill. After the k!lling, he reportedly cut the child and asked them to stab him in the back so he could claim he had been att@cked.

During the original trial, Rhodes had claimed he k!lled his wife in self-defence. Dawn Rhodes’s death followed the end of the couple’s relationship, as they were in the process of separating following revelations of infidelity.

The pair had known each other for more than 20 years, having met when Rhodes was 21 and Mrs Rhodes was 18.

After marrying in 2003, the couple lived in Epsom and across Surrey before eventually settling near Redhill.