Battered to death: Grandmother Valerie Graves
A burglar jailed for life for the ‘Midsomer murder’ of a grandmother was caught when his wife tipped off police five years later.
Father-of-two Cristian Sabou, a 28-year-old odd-job man, pleaded guilty to bludgeoning Valerie Graves to death with a claw hammer in her bed over Christmas in 2013.
Miss Graves, 55, had just woken up as the killer was burgling the £1.6 million seaside home she was house-sitting.
Sabou had drunk a bottle of whiskey before cycling to the scene and walking through unlocked patio doors into the ground-floor bedroom in the dead of night. But he panicked when Miss Graves woke – beating her to death with his hammer.
At Lewes Crown Court in Sussex yesterday, the Romanian was told that he would serve a minimum of 24 years for the killing in Bosham near Chichester, West Sussex.
The crime became known as the ‘Midsomer Murder’ because the ITV crime mystery series had filmed an episode called Written in Blood at the idyllic coastal spot in 1998.
For nearly six years the murder remained unsolved, with the killer at large.
Left: Father-of-two Cristian Sabou, a 28-year-old odd-job man, pleaded guilty to bludgeoning Valerie Graves to death with a claw hammer in her bed over Christmas in 2013. Right: Estranged wife: Claudia Sabou
Speaking from her shack in rural Transylvania, with their two daughters clutching her skirt, Sabou’s now-estranged wife Claudia, 27, revealed it was her detective work, against threats from him, which solved the case.
But she said Sussex Police should have homed in on him earlier – revealing she sent emails to officers after outing the killer.
She said that last year she found he had been searching online for ‘murder in Bosham’ and ‘hammer’. She then recognised a photograph of the weapon on Sabou’s phone as being his, and first confronted him. Then, in October last year, she told British police.
Astonishingly, Sabou returned to England unchallenged and remained at large for nine months after she told the authorities.
Target: Miss Graves, 55, had just woken up as the killer was burgling the £1.6 million seaside home (pictured) she was house-sitting
Weapon: Killer’s hammer. For nearly six years the murder remained unsolved, with the killer at large
He was eventually arrested living with a new girlfriend in July at his flat on Vlad Tepes Street – named after Vlad the Impaler – in the town of Dej in Transylvania.
Mrs Sabou said: ‘I saw on the Google history [on his phone] ‘murder in Bosham’ and ‘hammer’. I showed him the phone and asked him, ‘What is this all about?’ There was a picture of a hammer on there and I asked him, ‘Isn’t this the hammer you had in England?’ I knew it, I’d seen it there. I told him then and there, that I wanted to break up.
‘He said, ‘Don’t break up with me – and keep your mouth shut’. I told him I would not break up with him, and waited until he left to return to England.’ She added: ‘I kept pressing the police, sending emails, asking, ‘How long is this going to take?’ ‘
Mrs Sabou was finally visited by UK police in April, who collected DNA samples. She waited anxiously until Sabou was arrested in July, a few miles from her.
He was flown to Britain in handcuffs days later. Mrs Sabou and her husband moved to Chichester six years ago, living in a caravan at a scrapyard on the A27. She knew he had worked at the house where Miss Graves was murdered, alongside a friend who was regularly hired by its owners Malcolm and Caroline Chamberlain.
The Chamberlains holidayed in Costa Rica over Christmas 2013, with Sabou assuming the house was empty. He had come to believe there was a safe there, stuffed with gold ingots and cash. Miss Graves had recently moved south to Bracklesham Bay, West Sussex, after living in Scotland to care for her mother Eileen, 87.
After celebrating her birthday on Christmas Day, on December 29 she was in the downstairs bedroom.
Her sister Janet, 60, Janet’s boyfriend Nigel Acres, 59, and their mother were all upstairs.
The next morning Miss Graves’s sister found her dead in bed with horrific injuries to her head and face.
Police found the hammer 600 yards away, but remained stumped despite rewards and 3,000 voluntary DNA samples from locals, plus 9,500 interviews.
Last night Sussex Police said international protocols had to be complied with before Sabou could be held.
In court yesterday Sabou, who wore a poppy, pleaded guilty immediately after the two-minute Remembrance Day silence.
Jailing him, Judge Christine Laing QC said: ‘It was your cowardice and lack of morality which led you to kill Valerie Graves.’
It is understood Mrs Sabou could receive at least £10,000 reward for reporting her husband. Police refused to discuss any payout.