Wife desperate for baby locked fugitive husband in cupboard as he hid from police... and only let him out to have sex
By Daily Mail Reporter
13th July 2011
A broody wife hid her husband in a cupboard while he was on the run from prison - and only let him out to have sex, a court heard yesterday.
Claire Thomas, 40, was 'desperate' for a baby after her husband Wyndham Thomas, a convicted murderer, had been behind bars for 12 years.
Mrs Thomas hid him in a storage closet in their home in Caerphilly, South Wales, when police came looking for the fugitive after three days on the run.
Thomas, 33, would only be let out of the cupboard for sex with Claire - in the hope she would get pregnant before he was caught.
Jenet Treharne, defending, said: 'They wanted an opportunity to spend some intimate time together to start a family.
'She knows that she was very foolish.'
Newport Crown Court heard that Thomas knew his wife was 'very anxious' to have children when he fled his open prison in the baby jailbreak.
Mrs Thomas did not know he fled - but when he turned up on her doorstep she said: 'Quick get upstairs.'
Miss Treharne described Thomas as a 'very, very sad case' desperate to have children.
She said: 'She had sent a letter to the justice secretary asking for IVF treatment.'
She said that Thomas had hoped to talk her husband into giving himself up or to contact the police herself - but her 'wish for a child had seemed greater'.
The court heard how Mrs Thomas claimed her husband had only been there 20 minutes - but police believe it was at least two days.
Mrs Thomas is still not pregnant - nine months after her husband escaped.
Her husband was serving a life sentence for murdering a father trying to protect his home.
He was jailed in 1998 for the murder of taxi driver Christopher Williams, 23, during a break in at his home.
Thomas and two other men - Alan Naylor and Christopher Chislett - broke into the house where Mr Williams lived with his fiancee and their young daughter.
The court heard that Mr Williams was fatally stabbed in the heart after he confronted the trio when he returned to find them burgling his home.
His fiancee and their young daughter were both asleep at the time in the house house in Nantyfyllon, near Maestegat.
Mr Williams was called a 'decent and brave young man' by the trial judge.
Thomas was 12 years into his sentence when he walked out of Prescoed open prison in Usk, South Wales.
After a three-day manhunt, police discovered Thomas hiding at his wife's home 15 miles away in Caerphilly.
He was captured and sent to a more secure prison.
Claire, of Caerphilly, pleaded guilty at Newport Crown Court to harbouring an escaped prisoner.
Judge Eleri Rees sentenced her to 24 weeks imprisonment suspended for 18 months at Newport Crown Court.
Judge Rees said she accepted the couple were anxious to have children - but that the 'foolish escapade' had pushed their plans back two years.
She said: 'Wyndham Thomas has paid a very high price for it and dashed all hope for several years of regaining freedom. That, of course, means that you too have to be punished in that way.'
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