BT boss, 70, who beat his wife to death WINS court battle to claim a share of her £2.5m estate

A high-flying BT executive who killed his wife with a marble chopping board has won an ‘exceptional’ court fight to claim a share of the £2.5million estate she left behind. 

Leslie Winnister bludgeoned his wife of 40 years, Suzanne, to death while in the grip of delusions that she was having an affair and trying to poison him.

Winnister, who had worked as BT’s treasurer, was sentenced to an indefinite hospital order after admitting manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility in June last year.

But lawyers for Winnister went to the High Court in London on his behalf and have won the right for him to take a share of his victim’s £2.5million estate – although the law generally dictates that killers cannot profit from their crimes by inheritance.

He now stands to inherit more than £200,000 due to the unusual ruling, with the rest of his ex-wife’s estate being shared among her seven heirs.  

The court heard that Winnister, 70, is now confined at the Bracton medical centre in Dartford, Kent.

The judge who sentenced him said Winnister was in the grip of an acute mental disorder when he killed his wife, and a defence psychiatric expert found he was ‘suffering from severe depression with psychotic features’ – although not legally insane.

Suzanne Winnister’s body was found at the couple’s £1.6million gated home in Bexley, Kent, in September 2020.

The grisly discovery was made by Mrs Winnister’s niece Kate Cox and her husband Simon, who had visited the home after the family was unable to reach the 66-year-old on the phone.

Mr Cox jumped over the fence to get into the house and found Mrs Winnister lying in a pool of blood in her kitchen. A chopping board that had been used to batter her to death was next to her and the pensioner’s throat had also been slashed. 

Her cause of death was ‘head and neck injuries consistent with being hit on the head with a heavy blunt object’.

Winnister had gone to the King’s Head pub in Bexley high street after killing Suzanne, 66, where he drank a pint and bought a packet of crisps.  

Later, he was discovered by police in a nearby graveyard in blood-soaked clothes, and told officers: ‘I’ve just had a terrible day.’

Mrs Winnister was discovered by family members at the couple’s gated home in Bexley, Kent, and was pronounced dead at the scene after police and paramedics arrived

The couple’s relationship had begun to fray in late 2019, London’s High Court heard – ‘possibly triggered by a text message sent by Suzanne to Leslie by mistake when it had been meant for their handyman’.

The message read: ‘Are you coming today?’ and was signed off with an ‘x’.

When the spring 2020 lockdown kicked in, he ‘began to regularly accuse Suzanne not only of infidelity but also of trying to poison him’, the court heard.

In August that year, he confronted and attacked the family’s handyman with a crowbar, before smashing windows and running away.

Winnister was locked up indefinitely under a hospital order after pleading guilty to manslaughter due to diminished responsibility.

In the High Court case Winnister was facing Suzanne’s seven beneficiaries, including her mother Sheila, nephew James Higgins, and close friend Beverley Johnson.

Under Suzanne’s will, made in 2013, Winnister stood to inherit her estate valued at between £2million and £2.5million, although some of her assets were held in their joint names.

Owen Curry – for Winnister – explained that by law those convicted of murder or manslaughter cannot normally inherit from their victims or profit from their crimes.

But the 1982 Forfeiture Act provides a loophole allowing this rule to be modified in exceptional circumstances.

The barrister argued that Winnister’s is just such an ‘exceptional’ case given his relatively low level of guilt.

If the normal forfeiture rules applied, Suzanne’s estate would have been split among her ‘default’ heirs – Sheila, James and Beverley as well as Leslie’s niece Kathryn Cox, great-niece Isabelle Cox, and nephew Daniel Andrews.

But subject to the judge’s approval, lawyers struck a deal through which Winnister would receive a slice of his wife’s estate based on a 17.5 per cent share of all her heirs’ legacies – apart from her mother and nephew.

Pictured: Police outside the couple’s home in Bexley, Kent, in September 2020

The couple, who did not have children, were extremely wealthy and although the value of Suzanne’s estate is not entirely clear it is believed to be worth up to £2.5million, although still subject to tax and administration costs, the court heard.

Even in his own right, Winnister is a rich man, possessing assets totaling over £1million, and Mr Curry accepted he has ‘significant resources of his own’, telling the judge he is looking for only a relatively small proportion of his late wife’s fortune.

And he asked the judge to take full account of Winnister’s unhinged state, arguing: ‘Although this was a tragic and shocking killing, Mr Winnister had low or very low culpability for what happened.’

The sentencing judge had accepted Winnister’s level of guilt was low, since ‘his offending was wholly or almost wholly attributable to his mental disorder’.

‘Leslie misconstrued the position and wrongly concluded that Suzanne might have been having an affair with [the handyman],’ explained barrister William East, who was representing Suzanne’s mother and nephew in the High Court case.

‘Both the prosecution and defence experts in the criminal proceedings advised that, although mental illness was the main attributable factor for the killing, Leslie understood what he was doing and he knew that it was wrong,’ he added.

In her ruling, High Court judge Chief Master Karen Shuman ruled that Winnister can inherit the agreed portion of his wife’s fortune.

Although it has not yet been calculated, the amount he will get in property and bank accounts will total more than £200,000.

The rest of Suzanne’s fortune will be divided among her seven heirs, the court heard.

The judge will give her reasons for approving the settlement at a later date.

Speaking during Winnister’s sentencing last year, the court heard moving victim impact statements from several of Mrs Winnister’s loved ones.

Mr Cox said the memory of discovering her body remained ‘imprinted on his mind’ and was something he will have to live with for the rest of his life.

‘I am angry with Les and the devastation he has done to his family,’ he said. 

‘My children lost not only an auntie, they lost an uncle. I hope that Les will come to terms with the gravity if his actions on the people who knew and loved Suzanne.

‘Not matter what, she didn’t deserve what was done to her.’