‘He was a kind and loving husband’: Army sergeant’s wife DEFENDS him after he tried to kill her

The wife whose Army sergeant husband twice tried to kill her said today she is not angry with him and insists he was a ‘kind and loving’ man.

Victoria Cilliers, 42, said she still loves the Emile Cilliers she knew before he tried to gas her at home with their young children inside before he tampered with her parachute sending her crashing to earth from 4,000ft. 

Cilliers was described as ‘cold, calculating and controlling’ and was a habitual cheat and degenerate who wanted his wife’s £120,000 life insurance to pay off his rising debts.

He was also sleeping with two other women including his first wife and a skydiver he met on Tinder while also organising unprotected sex with escorts and signing up to a sex club and swingers’ site to find a ‘f*** buddy’.

Victoria Cilliers said she still loves the Emile Cilliers she knew when he tried to kill her and says he was ‘kind’ to her

Victoria Cilliers said she cannot bring herself to believe he would do it and said jury who convicted him did not see his kinder side

Emile Cilliers (pictured with Victoria) was described as 'cold, calculating and controlling' and was a habitual cheat and degenerate who wanted his wife's £120,000 life insurance to pay off his rising debts. 

Emile Cilliers (pictured with Victoria) was described as ‘cold, calculating and controlling’ and was a habitual cheat and degenerate who wanted his wife’s £120,000 life insurance to pay off his rising debts. 

A jury at Winchester Crown Court unanimously agreed he was bent on killing his wife.

Vicky, a 42-year-old physiotherapist, who fell 4,000ft to earth, accepts her husband was a serial philanderer but cannot bring herself to believe he was willing to kill her

Vicky, a 42-year-old physiotherapist, who fell 4,000ft to earth, accepts her husband was a serial philanderer but cannot bring herself to believe he was willing to kill her

But Mrs Cilliers said today his wife, who was extremely lucky to survive the attempts on her life over Easter 2015, says she still ‘struggles to accept’ he wanted to murder her.

In an extraordinary interview she even appeared to defend him, suggesting the jurors failed to see his ‘kind and loving side’.

She told Good Morning Britain: ‘It’s such a massive thing to get your head around and I’m still pretty stunned. I’m struggling to accept he tried to kill me. It’s such a massive thing to accept.

‘It’s hard to conceive someone so close to you would want to cause you some kind of harm.

‘I never had any indication that there was another side to him. I hope he didn’t hate me. I really don’t know. I love the husband I had and I’m grieving for that marriage. We’ve had no contact for the last three years. 

‘He’s a very confident individual. The side that they don’t see is that he was a kind and loving husband’.

She added: ‘I’ve been through every emotion under the sun – I’ve had plenty of time to think about things. Which is why I’m not overtly angry. I’ve got children – I can’t be angry or bitter. I need to keep going for them’.  

Emile Cilliers tried to kill his wife Victoria twice - first with a gas leak and then in a parachute jump - to get his hands on her money and start a new life

Emile Cilliers tried to kill his wife Victoria twice - first with a gas leak and then in a parachute jump - to get his hands on her money and start a new life

Emile Cilliers tried to kill his wife Victoria twice – first with a gas leak and then in a parachute jump – to get his hands on her money and start a new life. His wife, who gave evidence in court, has not told their children

Emile and Vicky Cilliers pictured skydiving together over Wiltshire in 2011. A court found he tried to kill her by cutting the cords of her parachute

Emile and Vicky Cilliers pictured skydiving together over Wiltshire in 2011. A court found he tried to kill her by cutting the cords of her parachute

Mrs Cilliers has not told their children he could face life in jail for attempting to murder her – even though they were in the house when he tried to blow her up

Mrs Cilliers has acknowledged that she will have to tell her two young children that their father ‘has done a bad thing’, but cannot bring herself to reveal that he tried to kill her twice.

'Cold, calculating and callous' Emile Cilliers will be kicked out of the military 'within seven days' and could face life in jail for trying to kill his wife, twice

‘Cold, calculating and callous’ Emile Cilliers will be kicked out of the military ‘within seven days’ and could face life in jail for trying to kill his wife, twice

In a startling exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, during which she lost the composure which has seen her through two dramatic trials, the 42-year-old physiotherapist also insisted that she does not believe her husband’s guilt.

‘Yes I’m hurt and angry. But can I see Emile as capable of murder? No,’ she told the paper, adding: ‘My family, friends, everyone seems to think they know more than I do. They see different evidence to me.’

Mrs Cilliers, who is originally from Haddington, East Lothian, also suggested she has no immediate plans to divorce her husband, who had been conducting an affair behind her back, although she has vowed to confront him in prison to ask: ‘What the hell? Why? Why is this all happening?’

She admitted she had spent the past three years since her husband’s arrest telling the couple’s son and daughter that their daddy has gone away for work.

Her priority now was to ensure they have ‘a happy, well-adjusted life’, adding: ‘I want boring and normal for us now, for them to grow up untainted.

‘One of the hardest things to deal with has been our daughter’s questions and her hurt. She still asks regularly, “Where’s daddy? When am I going to see him? Why can’t I speak to him on FaceTime?”’

The tearful wife of the Lothario army sergeant who tried to murder her by sabotaging her parachute says it was the thought of her children that made her battle to survive as she plummeted to the ground below

The tearful wife of the Lothario army sergeant who tried to murder her by sabotaging her parachute says it was the thought of her children that made her battle to survive as she plummeted to the ground below

Carly Taylor, the first wife of Emile Cilliers

Stephanie Goller, the Tinder lover of Emile Cilliers

Cilliers married Carly Taylor (left) and cheated on her with skydiver Stephanie Goller (right) while chasing sex with prostitutes

Cilliers, who had ‘out of control’ debts racked up by taking his lover on expensive holidays, first attempted to kill his wife by tampering with a gas valve at their home in Amesbury, Wiltshire, at the end of March 2015.

Their young daughter and son were both in the house with their mother at the time.

Cilliers, who was also in contact with prostitutes and having sex with one of his ex-wives, made a second attempt on her life by sabotaging both her main and reserve parachutes, causing her to fall 4,000ft to the ground.

Mrs Cilliers, a highly experienced parachuting instructor, suffered near-fatal injuries in the failed jump at the Army Parachute Association at Netheravon, Wiltshire, on Easter Sunday, April 5, 2015, but ‘miraculously survived’.

She told the MoS that she does not believe her husband tried to kill her: ‘He was my husband. Yes, things might have been breaking down. He’d been unfaithful, he’d had issues with money, but that is not attempted murder.’

She said she accepted her husband was a serial philanderer and a skilled liar, that he had a sordid appetite for sex with swingers and prostitutes and that he had pressing debts. 

Vicky, a 42-year-old physiotherapist, who fell 4,000ft to earth, accepts her husband was a serial philanderer but cannot bring herself to believe he was willing to kill her

Vicky, a 42-year-old physiotherapist, who fell 4,000ft to earth, accepts her husband was a serial philanderer but cannot bring herself to believe he was willing to kill her

Emile and Vicky Cilliers pictured skydiving together over Wiltshire in 2011. A court found he tried to kill her by cutting the cords of her parachute

Emile and Vicky Cilliers pictured skydiving together over Wiltshire in 2011. A court found he tried to kill her by cutting the cords of her parachute

Vicky about to do a jump from a plane. She is a veteran of an astounding 2,600 jumps

Vicky about to do a jump from a plane. She is a veteran of an astounding 2,600 jumps

She knows he wanted to leave her to start a new life with his blonde mistress and that a life insurance pay-out would have helped fund it.

But she still cannot bring herself to believe he was willing to kill her in such a cold-hearted, premeditated way and leave their daughter, now six, and son, now three, motherless.

She has not spoken to Cilliers since he was charged three years ago and says she does not love him any more but wants to visit him in prison adding: ‘Perhaps I’ll parachute in.’

She said she dreads the day that their son discovers Cilliers lied to his mistress and said he was not his biological father. ‘I can live with his lies, it’s the betrayal of my children which is the hardest to bear,’ she added.

Physically, Mrs Cilliers has made a full recovery, although her pelvis is held together with metal pins. ‘Bones heal, but hearts, probably not,’ she told the paper.

Cilliers, 38, of the Royal Army Physical Training Corps, is awaiting sentence for two charges of attempted murder and a third of recklessly endangering life.

He was convicted following a retrial at Winchester Crown Court and has been remanded in custody until sentencing on June 15.



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