Man who murdered wife in Redhill has ‘unduly lenient’ sentence increased
Robert Rhodes, 53, plotted the murder in 2016 for months
Last updated 7th Jul 2026
A man who murdered his wife in Redhill has had the minimum term of his life sentence increased from 29 and a half years to 33 and a half years after the Court of Appeal ruled it was “unduly lenient”.
Robert Rhodes, 53, from Withleigh, Devon, cut his wife Dawn’s throat in their family home in Redhill, Surrey, in 2016, having plotted the murder for months.
After killing his wife, Rhodes stabbed himself, as part of a plan to claim that he acted in self-defence.
A jury at a trial at the Old Bailey believed his false story and acquitted him in 2017, but in 2021 he was convicted after new evidence came to light.
Rhodes was found guilty at a second trial at Inner London Crown Court in December of murder, two counts of perjury for false evidence at his Old Bailey trial and in the family courts in 2018, perverting the course of justice, and child cruelty.
Solicitor General Ellie Reeves referred his sentence to the Court of Appeal as “unduly lenient”, and lawyers told a hearing on Tuesday that the murder sentence alone should have had a starting point of 30 years before the other offences were taken into account.
Lawyers for Rhodes, who attended via a video link from HMP Wayland in Norfolk, said that the sentence should remain “as is”.
In a ruling, Lady Justice May, sitting with Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb and Judge Nigel Lickley KC, agreed that the sentence was unduly lenient and said that the murder was “truly appalling”, adding: “We find it hard to conceive of a more heinous plot.”
Tom Little KC, for the Solicitor General, told the court in written submissions that Rhodes had contemplated murdering his wife by January 2016 at the latest after he found out that she was having an affair.
Rhodes told police after the murder that Dawn Rhodes had attacked him.
He escaped justice for eight years.
Mr Little said that the murder involved “significant planning and premeditation”, adding in court the the case was of “exceptional seriousness”, and that Mrs Justice Ellenbogen was “wrong”.